Chasing Cars
by Toshiku Yumari
Summary: Amarante feels like she's missing something in her life, but she just can't seem to find it. When Seth sends her on an unexpected mission, she wonders if this might be the opportunity she's looking for to find what her life is lacking. RexXOC
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

"You seriously think this is a good idea?" I heard Zander ask Seth—my supposed legal guardian. Who knows why; Seth was hardly the type to care about other people. He never had seemed like it.

"Yes, this plan is flawless," Seth replied, his voice told Zander that he had asked a very obvious question. "If we send her out there, she's trained well enough that she can beat the D-Team—a mission you, Ed, and Ursula don't seem capable of accomplishing."

"You just don't believe in us enough." Zander mumbled, making me half-smile. I could tell that he wasn't kidding about it either. Zander was the type of person to think something like that. Ed seemed like that kind too. Ursula would just complain that they didn't get enough money or food for it though.

But just because that's what he thought, didn't mean that he'd wanted Seth to actually hear it. Seth glanced over at him with a strange look on his face; I figured that he'd heard Zander's little comment. And probably hadn't liked what he heard. "What?"

"Never mind, never mind. But why do we need to send her by herself? Can't we send Rod and Laura with Rante? She'd be better off then, and maybe they could help her defeat the D-Team—"

Zander tried to argue with Seth, but he was taking none of it into consideration at all. His mind was made up, and there was no changing it now. Seth cut him off saying, "No. They would only slow her down. Now go and find Ran—"

I figured that now was as good a time as any to make my presence in their conversation known. "I heard my name?" I walked into the room, curious to find out why they were talking about me, but trying to make both of them think that I'd just been walking by and really had just heard my name.

"Why are you here?" Seth asked coldly. I guessed I wasn't supposed to be there yet to hear about the plan; me overhearing it wasn't part of it at all, and I was supposed to be somewhere else until he actually called for me. Well, that little bit kinda back-fired for him.

"I heard you say my name in your plans a few times. I was just curious about the reason why." I answered him, trying to sound like I'd just walked by and heard my name instead of standing outside with my ear pressed up against the door so I could hear what they were talking about.

He sighed, aggravation all over his tone, though, there was barely ever a time anymore that there wasn't. "Doctor Z. and I have decided to let you have this," Seth reached into one of the pockets in his dark brown and red lab coat and handed me an Alpha Scanner—I, however, preferred to call them DinoHolders. I didn't really know why, it just sounded better to me. "And have you actually start working for us, not just hanging around here and not studying like you should be—which you always seem to be."

"I don't get a say in this, do I?" I questioned with an attempt at a sly grin as I reached out and took the well-known to me device from him. Little did he know, I'd been screwing around—er, practicing with both Rod's and Laura's DinoHolders, just to see what would happen if I did or didn't do something to it.

Apparently they could withstand lemonade, iced tea, and regular water. And a really big mallet.

"No, you don't. And you may want this too." Seth answered, ignoring my try at a joke and taking it just as seriously as he did everything. He handed me a card, not even glancing at the picture to be sure of what he had.

"…A platypus?" I asked him, a confused and _'are you seriously that stupid' _look on my face as I stared at the very strange, cartoon-like creature on the face of the card. It had an air soft gun, and a safari hat.

"…Oh, wrong card. Here," He took the platypus card and tossed it to Zander, who didn't hesitate to drop it on the floor. Seth then handed me a different card, most likely the one I was supposed to have gotten in the first place: a Deinonychus.

"A Deinonychus? Right?" I asked, making sure that was the dinosaur I was supposed to be being given, so I wouldn't end up looking stupid for taking the wrong card.

"Yes, or at least that's what it should be. I don't believe I took any other cards from Zander and Ed today. And speaking of that," Seth turned to Zander before scowling, his tone changing to a bit more of an angry one. "If you two ever skip off on your work again—"

"No, no, it's not a platypus Seth." I replied, a stupid smile on my face. Though, I couldn't help but wonder what he was going to say to Zander if I hadn't cut him off.

"You should already know how to use these from what you learned in your studies, correct?" Zander asked me, a small amount concern in his voice.

Oh yeah, my studies, the only thing I could ever do around here. Of course I knew what to do with what they gave me. "Yeah, I know what to do. What exactly do you want me to do? I heard some of the plans, but it would help if you explained a bit more of it to me."

Seth sighed again; I guess I was supposed to read his mind and figure it out on my own. Even from the time he'd adopted me—I still don't know why he did in the first place though—he'd always expected me to be the best of the best. And whenever I couldn't do what he expected of me, he would reject being around me for a while, but would eventually give me another chance.

This was my last chance. "All you need to do for now, is just befriend the D-Team, simple enough?" Seth told me, making the whole thing sound even more simple than it had when just he and Zander had been talking. I assumed he was trying to dumb it down for me; like I needed him to at all.

I thought about what he was asking me to do. I didn't know where the D-Team was. I'd only heard of them from Rod and Laura's stories. I never really got along with many people. Ed and Ursula always told me it was my personality; I guess I was just never really the type to be able to go right up to someone and immediately be able to become their best friend.

But maybe it wasn't just how I was, maybe it was all based from my past. Ed and Ursula had tried to tell me what had happened to my parents, but I didn't let them get far. It hurt too much to hear that I'd never actually had them there for me, to know that I didn't know what it felt like to be loved by someone.

I wanted to know that feeling that someone actually cared. Ed, Ursula, and Zander did show slight concern for me every now and then, but that was only because to them I was a child. They thought I didn't know how to live my life normally, like they knew what normal was, and I didn't. I knew I wasn't like a normal kid. They didn't have to rub it in.

"Yeah. I can do that." I replied, my grip slightly tightening on the card. I was going to show all of them that I wasn't just some little kid, doing nothing but get in the way. I would show them that I could handle a mission better than any of them.

"Good. Now take this," Zander told me as he handed me a phone. "This is the only thing we have to communicate with you for the time being. Try not to loose it, but don't worry if you do. We'll just figure out something else out I suppose."

I looked it over. It was probably one of the coolest phones I'd ever seen. It was a video phone, a camera, it could record anything, and it did a lot of other stuff too besides just being a regular phone. I would have to test everything out when I got the time to later.

I slipped it into my pocket, and looked back over at them. I wanted to get started and leave already, but I didn't want to screw anything up right off the bat because I didn't know something, so I asked, "Is there anything else I need or should know?"

"Laura and Rod wanted to talk to you before you left." Seth told me, his face still held no emotion to speak of at all. It was impossible to see anything in his eyes; emotionless, blank, and dark. Nothing that I knew or could see that told me he had a heart.

"Okay. Good luck with the whole lab/research stuff while I'm gone, Seth; and Zander, make sure he doesn't blow anything up." I replied as I turned and headed to the door. I didn't want to come back to a blown-up island.

"No promises." Zander told me smiling. I knew that if anyone was going to blow something up, it was most likely going to either be Zander himself, Ed, or Rod. Laura and Ursula didn't seem like the type to go around blowing stuff up all the time. Everyone else on the other hand…

I smiled back slightly at him before turning to go and find Laura and Rod. Though, honestly I didn't really want to talk to them. Knowing them, if they knew I was leaving, they were gonna cry for no apparent reason. And I didn't like it when people cried in front of me. I never knew what to do when it happened, and it sucked feeling so powerless against someone else.

When I did actually find them, Laura kept sniffling, and I could tell Rod was trying not to. Rod was the first one to speak. I knew one of them was gonna cry soon; hopefully they could hold it in until I was well out of hearing range. "We heard from Ursula that you were going to be leaving today."

Darn you Ursula. "Guys, I'm not leaving forever—though, if I'm lucky, I will be. I'm just going to try and actually complete the mission that Ursula, Ed, and Zander couldn't. I'll be back sometime—maybe; and you can call me anytime you want to, I guess." I told them, trying to soothe their sadness the best I could so that they wouldn't start bawling if they had it in them right now.

I never would've guessed that they would care that I was leaving, but I suppose that since I was older then them by a little bit, they might see me as a friend, though, I never really considered it.

"We'll probably call every now and then…about maybe five minutes apart at most." Rod told me, a grin glued to his face. I didn't doubt that he wouldn't do that. Actually, I expected that he was going to go through with that plan.

I was surprised when they both hesitantly moved over to me and gave me a hug. This was new to me actually. I'd never actually been hugged before that I could remember. I didn't mind it I guess, but it wasn't something that I wanted to get used to.

I thought about wrapping my arms around them and returning the hug because I would miss them a little bit too, but I didn't. I wanted to, but I wasn't used to this kind of contact.

They pulled away smiling, tears in their eyes. I don't think I could handle it if they both cried at the same time. I don't think I could even take it if just one of them started crying. "Call me whenever you guys want to, even at one AM. I won't mind, I suppose. I'll just kill you when I get back…"

I started backing up towards the door, waving the whole way there so they knew I was leaving, and this wasn't some kind of cruel joke. When I got to the door, I opened it, and dashed outside, heading straight for one of the jets to take me off of the island.

Luckily, I was able to sneak to the hangars without being caught in a bear hug by Ed, or given a huge lecture on whatever Ursula felt like lecturing me about. I jumped into one of the jets, and got up in the air.

I'd been up in the air for a few minutes, when my phone rang. Even though I hadn't even started messing around with all the setting on it yet, it had a pretty sweet ring tone already. "Rante." I answered the phone, despite the fact that the awesome sounds stopped.

"Rante, do you know where you need to go to find the D-Team?" I heard Seth's voice ask me. Even over the phone he was cold, and went directly to the point. Though, I couldn't see him asking about the weather like normal people do when they call each other.

"…No, I've never been told where to go, just to befriend them. And I think you know how hard it is to do so if you can't find them. So where to?" I glanced out the window for a split second as the sound of thunder rumbled through the air.

"Japan. I'm downloading the exact location of their home into your phone." Seth replied. I could hear him typing in the background. I couldn't help but wonder how cool it would be to play Pinball on that giant computer screen of his.

"Alright. How's everything actually holding up back at Zetta Point?" I asked, remembering how sad Rod and Laura had looked. Knowing them, they were probably getting rid of their sadness by blowing stuff up or seeing what would happen to a tomato if you put it in the oven for an hour.

I switched on the auto-pilot, and looked out the window. It had just started raining. And it wasn't just normal rain-rain, it was holy-crap-that's-a-lot-of-frickin'-water-rain.

My mind was drawn back to the phone call when I heard Seth grunt, as if he were pushed away from the phone. Either Zetta Point was being robbed, Seth had just been murdered, or Rod and Laura had just happened.

"Hi Rante! Are you there?" I recognized Rod and Laura's voices.

"Hey guys," I said, thinking over if it was raining back there by them or not. If it was, they were probably wondering if it was raining by me. The vicious cycle of 'is it storming over by you'. It never ended till you answered the other person's question. "What did you do to Seth?"

"We shoved him," They said it as if it were normal. Though, they did shove Seth a lot when he got in their way. To me—and probably them too—it was normal. "Where are you now?"

"On my way to Japan. Is there anything I should know about the members of the D-Team before I meet them? Like, if one of them is an escaped convict or something, I think I'd want to know." I asked as I watched a drop of rain run down the window, imagining that it was me and that the other rain drops chasing after it were one of the D-Team and their other escaped convict buddies.

"Uhh, not really. All you need to know is that there are two boys, and one girl." They were ecstatic about giving me all the details. I could tell in their voices and by how many big words they were using.

"Anything out of the ordinary in their personalities I should try to stay away from?" I asked, still looking out the window, trying my best to get as much information about the people I was going to be encountering as I could.

"Uhh…" Rod thought about it for a while. His apparently small brain thinking over all the times he'd met the D-Team and actually taken the time to notice their personalities and stuff.

Laura answered faster than he did. "I don't think so, but the girl can get quite a temper. The leader can get kinda, strange at times, just so you know. And—" Their phone died before she could tell me more.

I sighed; I thought to myself with a half-smile, _"I think they hit a button. You never give Rod and Laura a button they aren't supposed to push. Because they'll push it anyway, even if it says right on it 'do not push'. Rod will push it saying, 'This looks fun!'"_

I glanced at the recent downloads on the phone; at least Seth had enough time to download the D-Team's coordinates before Rod and Laura stole the phone from him. I turned off the auto-pilot, and steered the jet a few miles away from their exact coordinates. I didn't want to land right in their backyard, that would be stupid, and in one of their enemy's jets? I wasn't that dim.

I landed in a wooded area, where barely one raindrop hit me. It was actually quite serene; the sound of he rain hitting the leaves on the trees in a rhythmic beat was calming. A nice way to start out the mission; a _whole_ different story for the middle of the sidewalk.

The rain beat down heavily upon me, to the point that I could barely see. Every so often someone would run by me, nearly running into me each time. I'd stopped by a street lamp to rest for a moment, when someone actually did run into me, knocking the back of my head against the pole.

As my surroundings grew black, I saw three pairs of feet run over to me. None of them were the person who'd rammed into me, even though I really hadn't gotten a close look at that person's feet anyway.

I felt warm arms wrap around me, their heat being the complete opposite of the rain; consciousness left me swiftly. Though, honestly I didn't care. It was cold outside, and whoever this person was, they were heating me back up.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2-

I opened my eyes slowly, immediately feeling intense pain in my arm as soon as I was fully awake. I grimaced from the hurting sensations and looked at my arm. I was surprised to see it bandaged; I could see fresh blood through the white bandage, but I didn't care. I needed to know where I was at before I could start worrying about my arm.

I tried to get up off of the couch I'd been laying on, but all I did was nearly fall on the floor. I was just glad there hadn't been anyone in the room to nearly see me fall on my face. I felt weak; this intense pain flew throughout my body, all of its energy centering in my arm.

I sat back down on the couch and studied my phone. I knew I should probably call Seth and tell him I'd made it here, but how was I supposed to know if there was anyone else within earshot anyway? I tried to make sure that it was still working right, but my head couldn't stand to think that much without giving myself a headache, so I slipped it back into my pocket.

I cradled my head in my hands, trying to make the annoying pain go away. I lifted my head as someone walked into the room. She had to be at least in her early thirties. Her brown hair was about to her shoulders, and her eyes were soft, and very kind-seeming.

I stood up to greet her, but nearly stumbled onto the floor instead because of my being still sort of weary from the unconsciousness. But I was able to talk to her nevertheless. "Hello." I spoke quietly; I was nervous to be in her home, however cozy and welcoming it seemed to be.

"Hi, I'm Aki Taylor," The woman replied with a warm smile. Her expression changed from one that she would greet a friend with to one that you would talk to someone in a coma with. "My son and his friends said they saw you unconscious leaning against a pole, a fairly large cut up your arm. Are you feeling alright? Are you hungry or thirsty? Anything I can do for you or get you?"

I flexed my fingers anxiously. I didn't know what to say or even how to say it if I did know what to say. I was still uneasy about her being so open with her home, heart, and hospitality; I didn't know if I liked it or not.

Three kids my age walked into the room. I knew right away it was the D-Team. It was impossible to have guessed otherwise and actually thought you were anywhere near the right answer.

I looked closely at each of their faces silently. One of the boys had brown, spiky hair, which he kept out of his face with a red visor with little triceratops horns on it. His clothes were a medley of red, orange, and yellow that seemed to match the visor and himself without even having known him.

A yellow-ish-orange baby Triceratops was standing at his side; it stared at me intently before making a small squeaking noise. I wondered if that was his way of asking me who I was. I would've smiled at the little guy in my own way of a small hello, but there were still others to be noted in the room.

The girl standing next to him had bright pink hair that stuck out to the sides (it scared me so much; I'd never seen a mentally stable person with hair like that in my life). She had sunglasses over her eyes—even though it was raining. Her clothes seemed to clash with her hair, but how would I know? I sucked at figuring out fashion crap: yellow shorts, a dark green shirt, and a yellow vest (a lot of yellow in this group, holy crap).

A white and pale green baby Parasaurolophus was standing next to her, staring at me motionlessly. It was like I was some kind of bug and the little dino was trying to squish me with its mind.

The last one was the one that struck me with the most surprise-force. Golden blonde hair adorned his head, slightly hiding his ears from sight. He wore a light and dark blue sweatshirt over a white t-shirt, the sweatshirt partially covered by a claw-like fossil hanging around his neck.

I had to admit, they had all caught me off guard. I hadn't seen any of them come in, and even if I had, I still wouldn't have been ready for the claw fossil-boy with the pretty, deep cerulean eyes.

I searched my mind for something to say as I continued to stare at the blonde-haired boy; he stared right back at me, seemingly completely unaware that I was completely flustered. I felt so dark inside, while he seemed to be filled with light that entirely blinded me.

Apparently the supposed Mrs. Taylor noticed us staring at each other—I was the one that was blushing like a tomato—for she chuckled slightly. We all looked over at her; I seemed to be the one that was most caught off-hand by her snicker. She asked me, "You haven't told me your name yet."

"Amarante," I answered hurriedly. The faster all of their questions concerning anything about me were answered, the better and easier everyone's lives would turn out. You can just call me Rante."

I turned to face the girl, quite disturbed as she squeaked. I could just tell it was a complaining squeak deep down inside, and not a compliment. "That's such a pretty name!" She exclaimed.

"You know who I am, now who are you?" I asked the three of them, looking into each of their eyes, each one holding a different kind of emotion. I didn't really know how to describe the emotion per say, but they seemed to be different no matter what.

"You can call me Max!" The brown haired boy told me beaming, happy to have been the first to tell me their name. He did seem like the type to butt in front of somebody that was four times his size in a line to a pickle stand or something. Just to end up getting not only beat to a quivering pulp, but a tomato on stick instead of a pickle.

"I'm just plain Zoe…" The pink haired girl whined, apparently upset to not have a name like mine. Even though mine was just as normal as the next person's, she obviously thought otherwise. Weird at all? I think so!

Finally, I looked over at the blonde haired boy. But before he could even tell me his name, I noticed a Carnotaurus standing next to him. My Deinonychus came out of her card and went over to him; she immediately took a liking to him and ran out of the room with the other baby dinosaurs to go and play.

"I'm Rex, and that was Ace." He told me, smiling and nodding his head in the direction that all the baby dinosaurs had just run. His voice rolled like the ocean itself, but was always calmer, just like a breeze. An ocean breeze…yeah, like that.

"The Deinonychus is Azami," I told them, motioning to my own dinosaur, who had just raced up the steps with the other dinosaurs. Honestly, I had just pulled that name out of my pocket. "Just call her Aza."

I felt weird; this weird feeling was different, it wasn't normal (which is why they call 'weird' weird). It seemed so…right. It was like—almost—an eagerness, or some sort of odd heart attack. But I had no idea what it was about or what to do. It was like this pulling at my spirit, I'd never felt this…thing before.

I finally turned away from Rex, and glanced at the window. It was still pouring rain. I sighed; I always liked the rain. It was like you could just…melt away everything about you that was bad, or unwanted in the falling water. It could purify you; just…make you happy again.

I turned back to them; silence had falling among all of us. But it didn't have enough time to stay forever, especially since Mrs. Taylor began to speak to me again. She asked me, "Do you have anywhere to stay?"

I thought for a moment. I could go back to Zetta Point, but then Seth might think I gave up on the mission, and I knew this was my last chance to get him to be proud of me. Or at least appreciate my being there around him and around Zetta Point and whatnot. His acceptance might be the only thing I needed.

"Actually, no, I don't," I answered, a lie forming its way on my lips. But I didn't really care right now; I didn't know them, they didn't know me. They wouldn't mind in the end. "I came here to try and find my parents, but when I asked one of their supposed friends, he told me that they'd died a few years back."

"Aww, poor thing!" Mrs. Taylor exclaimed with a sad, pitying tone. I didn't like when people looked down on me, but I tried not to let my bad feelings show. "Oh, I know! You can stay here! Stay as long as you like. I'll go and grab some things for you real quick." She smiled at me as she walked quickly out of the room.

I looked nervously back over at Max, Zoe and Rex. All of them looked back at me blankly, no one knowing what to do or say now. I only felt uneasy around Rex though. Maybe it was just because from here, he looked a bit taller than me or something.

Zoe suddenly got a happy-go-lucky look on her face as she ran over to me and exclaimed, scaring the frickin' crap out of me, "Finally! A girl I can hang out with! You want to go shopping or something tomorrow so we can get to know each other?"

I glanced quickly over at Max and Rex. They both seemed to be startled by Zoe's sudden outburst and acceptance of me. Rex blushed immediately when he saw me looking at him. I couldn't help but let a smile out. But I quickly took it away from my face. I only needed them to trust me; I didn't actually have to befriend them.

I looked back at Zoe and said with a forced smile, "Sure, that sounds cool." _Yeah, sure, whatever. When we get there, I can shove you in a fountain and run away laughing. That sounds real cool._

I glanced at Rex again, my face turning a light unnoticeable pink. This time Zoe noticed me look away from her (she was standing right in front of me, and it was getting really creepy), and followed my daydreaming gaze over to Rex. She turned back around to face me smiling evilly. _Crap, she saw me looking at Rex. Not good. _I thought to myself, quickly averting my eyes from Rex.

I looked around, aware now that there was a shortage of small, scaly, and big-eyed creatures. "Where did Aza go?" I asked; I hadn't been watching when they ran out of the room, and I hadn't been paying attention to if they even left the room at all anyway.

Everyone else looked around for their dinosaur too. "Where did all of them go?" Rex, Zoe, and Max questioned no one in particular simultaneously. I couldn't help but wonder how many times they were going to do that. _Note to self: count how many times that happens…_

I looked up as I heard a piece of paper tear. Rex's head quickly turned in the direction of the steps. He seemed either slightly expectant of the sound, or just a bit confused on whether or not he actually heard that.

"Uh-oh…" He mumbled quietly to himself as he started running for what I guessed was his room. It was either going to be for his room, or for whatever place in this house had paper.

I grew curious; since no one actually ran after him, I did. I walked through the hall, until I heard his footsteps and pieces of paper crackling. I walked into the nearest room; it was the right one. Rex was inside, looking down at Ace, who was just standing there, smiling at Rex who was now towering over him, just glaring down at the little guy.

I looked around the room; all the other little dinosaurs were chewing up a book, which I guessed must have been Rex's. I moved all of the little dinosaurs to Rex's bed, and started picking up some of the pieces, reading some of the words as I went. I was able to match up some of the pieces, and eventually I fixed one of the pages. I was surprised I could fix this thing at all.

"How many pages did they tear up, Rex?" I asked, still sorting out the pieces while he glared at Ace who was now on his bed. When I'd picked up Ace, Rex had followed, still scowling at the little dino as I placed him on the bed.

"Uhh, most of the book was fine; I think they only got to five or six. Why?" He questioned, looking away from a still grinning Ace to me, the angry look on his face disappearing to show a serene, more so calm one.

"Because I've already fixed three of them, and they're already back in their place in the book." I stated nonchalantly, seeming unmoved by my achievement, even though it was actually kind of a big deal. I didn't know I could figure stuff out that well.

"What?" Rex asked, obviously confused, but yet still impressed by how quickly I'd fixed most of the book. I wasn't the only one who thought I (might) be a frickin' idiot! Nope, Rex thought so too (or, I guessed that he did by his reply).

"Just bring me all the pieces you can find and I think I can fix it good as new." I told him as I attempted to tape another couple of pieces together. I wasn't sure if I could really fix it so it looked like it had just been bought, but I knew that you might be able to read it after I was done with it.

Rex started crawling around the room, picking up pieces of the torn book as he did. We were both on the floor, working on putting the book back together. The baby dinosaurs just sat there on the bed and watched us. Every now and then one of them (almost always Ace or Chomp) would want to get off of the bed and try to wreck the work we'd accomplished, but I would just push them back gently a little bit, rejecting their request to get off.

When Rex and I had found all of the pieces, we tried to match them all together to form the pages. Some times we would try to take the same piece to check if it would fit in the spot we needed, our hands would touch and we would both pull our hand back quickly and blush a light rose color. And we would ram into each others head with our own every now and then, only to apologize and blush. Whenever we touched, I felt so warm and fuzzy inside, it was a feeling I'd never experienced, and I didn't know what to think of it.

"I think we've got it put all back together." Rex told me triumphantly as he kneeled next to me on the floor, the book in my open hands. I glanced through it, but noticed a couple of little holes in the 'completely' fixed pages.

"Rex, we're still missing a few pieces." I pointed out, even though I didn't want to darken his already high spirits. He was too shiny, too light-surrounded; I didn't want to have to see his brightness fade into a dim dusk. Even after a couple hours of knowing him, it just didn't seem right.

"What? Where do we need them?" He asked while flipping through all of the pages we'd fixed, completely missing the page that was missing the pieces. I wondered if he knew that, and was just trying to see if I was paying any attention and knew what the heck I was talking about, or if he really didn't know.

"Right here," I said as I stopped his hand and flipped back to the correct page, at least four away from the one he had gone to just now. "We're missing three pieces from it. I can only guess that was one of the best parts too."

"How did it get in there if we haven't finished it yet?" Rex asked confusion in his voice. I guess he'd had no idea such a thing could happen in this world. Or, at least he was wondering how one of us didn't notice we were putting a…uhh, unfinished page back in the book.

I looked at the single page for a moment, looking over all of the words while I tried to remember if I'd read any of these words in any of the pages that I'd taped back together. "…I think you put that one in there."

"…Oh yeah, I did that," A sheepish grin crossed his face. "Well, those pieces couldn't have gone far. I'm going to take a look over here." Rex said to me as he crawled over to the foot of his bed.

I glanced around, taking in every possible space that a couple pieces of paper could fit. Well, that narrowed it down to…everything within eye-sight. In the end, I just decided to shove my arm behind his bookshelf and see what happened. My eyes lit up slightly when something paper-like touched my fingers.

"I found them Rex, they're over here." I said, my arm now halfway behind his bookshelf. I had a feeling half of my arm was going to get stuck back there, and then I was going to get the other half stuck trying to get that one back out. Well, at least I didn't need them that much…_Yeah, right Rante; of course you don't need your arms. You can get your phone out of your pocket with one toe, a carrot, and your nose!_

"But I just got…whatever," I could tell that Rex was a bit annoyed that I'd decided to tell him that I'd found the last pieces as soon as he'd gotten over to the place he was going to be looking for them at, but he did a good job hiding his small irritation anyway, "You got them?"

"Almost." I told him, straining my arm to try and reach them. My face contorted with the effort, but all of it had been worth it when I was finally able to reach them and curl my fingers around the slender pieces of what had originally been part of a giant tree. I'd always wondered exactly how long it would take to get paper if all you did was hit the tree with a pair of chop sticks.

"Got 'em!" I flashed the pieces of paper in front of my face happily, far too happy for the simple moment. It was like going around shouting, 'Look at me!! I just got three pieces of paper out from behind a super scary bookshelf! Somebody get me a sparkly medal!!'

"Let's go put them in the book." Rex said as he got up off the ground, walked over to the book, and picked it up. I got up, and walked over to him, the pieces of paper in my hand. As he held out the book, I taped the pieces of the page back into it.

"I think it's fixed." I told Rex as I put the final piece into place. He paged through the book, making sure that we'd gotten all of the pieces this time. Didn't want another mistake like that to happen. Even though, for me, it had been kinda funny.

"Yep, we got it." He told me, closing the book and smiling sweetly at me. I didn't think I'd ever seen a smile that pretty before; like looking at a diamond (with a possible smiley face drawn on the surface). I smiled back; a weird sensation swelled inside me, it was something I'd never experienced go on inside me. It was like the time I'd had that bad turkey—well, except, different…better.

He was still smiling at me when Max ran into the room. "Hey guys, have you seen Chomp?" After taking a glance around the room, he answered his own question and more. "Oh! There he is! Huh, I guess everybody's in here…"

He trailed off for a moment, and I considered the fact that he'd realized his easily answered questions had seemed a bit dumb. Better chance of seeing a pig grow wings and soar to the Empire State building and back without getting struck by lightning or being captured by a camera. "It stopped raining a little while ago. Why don't I take them outside to play before it gets too dark out?" He asked.

"Oh, okay. You want us to come out there and play with you guys too?" Rex asked, looking away from me for what seemed like the first time today. But, I figured that this was normal for anyone who met someone new. You have to keep an eye on them; ya know, see what they're like and what they're going to do. I knew I'd been doing the same to Rex since I met him too.

Well…there may've been another reason too…

"Sure, Zoe's already coming outside with us," Max answered Rex, then turned his attention (or at least how ever much he actually had in that head of his) to me. "Do you want to come too Rante?"

"Yeah, sure, whatever," I replied, a small smile crossing my face as I began to grow used to the nervousness I felt around all of them. It felt normal now, as if I'd always known it somehow. "I'm pretty sure there isn't anything they can chew up out there."

They both smiled at my joke; I smiled too, glad that befriending these people was turning out to be easier than Rod and Laura had made me think. For a minute, with the way that Rod and Laura had been talking, I'd thought that everyone here was going to end up being a bunch of sparkly vampires or something.

Max called all the baby dinosaurs to follow him, and then sprinted for the back door, which being glass, he ran into; he left a really big smudge on the door too. Having been good little baby dinosaurs, they all followed Max's lead: they crashed into it, and fell on top of Max.

Rex and I laughed as the little dinosaurs squirmed to get up off of Max, who was also trying to get up, but looked more like a turtle with a bunch of other little turtle holding him down. Honestly, it was one of the most awesome mental images in the world.

Rex and I walked over to the door, opened it for ourselves like normal people do when they come across a door, and stepped over everyone who was on the ground having an 'I can be more like a person that needs Life Alert than you can! Watch! I've fallen and I can't get up!' contest.

The baby dinosaurs and Zoe followed us outside promptly. But Max just kinda laid there inside the house for a minute or two, like he was trying to decided whether or not the floor was too comfortable to get up off of. But he did get up eventually and followed as if nothing had happened whatsoever.

Zoe had brought a pink soccer ball outside with her (it actually looked like a big ball of cotton candy that could withstand water, dirt, and Max), so we played soccer for a while with it.

But the game ended right after Chomp popped the ball. So, Zoe and Max complained to him about that, making gestures to the ball and then back to him, and all the while they were still whining to him. Rex and I just stood by a tree and watched everything unwind.

As Rex and I watched them complain to Chomp, I asked him with a sly smile, "This happen a lot?" I could guess the answer, but there was still the whole concept with me having to be friends with them, and a friend would ask anyway to make a conversation. So, now I had a bit more of a plan.

"Every time we play soccer," Rex answered casually, like this was a question that everyone asked when Chomp popped a soccer ball. I could just seem someone trying to ask, but he answers before they even get the chance. Maybe Rex could read minds…"That's why we usually don't."

I smiled at his reply; many awesome mental images were flooding my head right now. His face turned a light pink for a reason unknown to me, and smiled back. I felt a sudden static between us, mostly because I was getting nervous again. But it was different every time: sometimes just a tension, or a sudden surge of sentimental pressure. What the heck was going on inside me was something I wanted to know.

I looked back over at Zoe, Max and Chomp; Chomp had taken Max's visor and Zoe's sunglasses, and was now running around randomly (kinda like a lunatic—no, wait, that's Max—no, Zoe!) trying to keep them away from Zoe and Max, who were chasing after him trying hopelessly to get both of the pieces of headgear back. Rex and I laughed at them as they fell into a puddle of mud.

Our laughing fit was interrupted by my phone ringing. _Of course you ring now of all times. Why wouldn't you? I'm finally starting to actually have a good time, and you ruin it by calling me! Whoever you are, you suck!_

I took it out of my pocket and looked at the number; the call was from Zetta Point, where else could it have been from? Pluto? The classmate that was apparently sent to Pluto for being such a frickin' nuisance? Speaking of him, I missed that guy. He'd been cool…

"I should probably answer this." I told Rex as I walked a little ways away from them. I didn't want them hearing anything about Zetta Point. If they did, I may as well just do what the other three would do if they screwed up: go to the Bahamas for a week, or at least until Seth wasn't pissed beyond belief with them.

"Yeah?" I answered the phone, not even bothering to say hello or ask who it was. They'd say, or I could just do whatever came to mind, 'Yeah, sure Hey You, yeah, everything's fine, now, who the hell are you?'

"Rante, this is Ursula. Where are you? What's your location?" I was happy it wasn't Seth again. He'd probably say I'd been taking too long already and just to get back now if I wasn't going to get down to business. I would show him I could do this, I would show all of them.

"The Taylor's backyard," I answered simply and quietly. I had to make sure that no one heard me. Other than the person on the other line though. "This is where I'm going to be staying during the mission. So, so far so good. How are things holding up back there? Anything blow up yet? And if so, did you get a picture for me?"

"No, nothing has exploded yet, I would've told you and sent the picture if something had," Ursula answered; I could tell she was either smiling, or really annoyed now. "So far, Rod and Laura won't stop asking when you're coming back. They're—"

I didn't hear the rest of it, because the phone was taken from Ursula by Rod. He yelled into the phone, "Rante! Rante! Where are you? What's going on?" He didn't seem to care that I was gone one bit. _Ha, yeah, when he uncovers a bomb in the middle of the yard he's going to call me first after he blows it up and scream 'Where were you?!'_

"The Taylor's backyard," I told him the same thing I'd told Ursula. It was a pretty simple thing, but it applied to everything really. It was the answer to everything! 'Where were you? The Taylor's backyard. Where are your shoes? The Taylor's backyard. What the hell is Max eating over there? The Taylor's backyard.' "We're playing soccer, why?"

"Okay, I just wanted to know. Bye." He hung up before I could say something else. I stared at the phone for a minute before closing it again. _…What the hell is wrong with that kid…?_

I walked back over to Rex still staring at the phone for Rod's quick…uh, 'conversation' with me. Rex asked in a 'you don't look like the kind of person to stare at their phone for now reason' toned voice, "Who was that?"

For some reason I felt bad about having to lie to him, but I knew I had no other choice, so I said, "Telemarketer. Trying to sell me something, I think it was either something about 'Henry's Honey' or mustard. Have Zoe or Max caught Chomp yet?"

"Nope, Chomp locked them out of the house; they're trying to find a way to get in right now," Rex pointed over to Max, who was laying facedown on the grass. "Max tried catapulting himself from the fence, but he didn't think through the whole it's-way-the-heck-over-there problem."

"Don't you guys have a spare key or something?" I asked, even though I didn't want to end all of Chomp's fun. Or mine, because this was more fun to watch than it was to get involved and have a dinosaur with the brain the size of an orange to make a fool out of me.

"…Hey Dad!" Max yelled as he ran to the front of his house to either find his dad, or find another way inside. "Do we have a spare key? Or at least a ladder so I can reach the window?"

"I have it." Rex whispered to me as he pulled it out of his pocket and showed it to me. The little silver object seemed to glow with a red hue as the setting sunlight hit the metallic surface.

"Nice." I replied, snickering quietly. I hadn't expected such a thing to come from Rex. Maybe Zoe or Max, but it was nice to see that I'd been wrong. Today would've sucked all the more if I hadn't been wrong about a couple of things.

He slipped it back into his pocket silently. Even though he didn't make a sound in doing so, Zoe and her bat ears heard him nevertheless and began running towards us as she yelled, "Max! Rex has the key!"

When she got to us, she stopped right in front of us, stuck out her hand like the prissy little you'll-give-me-what-I-want-when-I-want-it person she was, and commanded, "Rex, give me the key."

"Which one?" Rex asked innocently as he pulled two keys from his pocket. I couldn't help but snicker. I didn't know why Rex had two keys in his pocket, but he knew how to use them.

Zoe gave me a small glare for laughing, and took both of the keys from Rex. She had to have figured that if one didn't work, that meant it was the other one. Or Rex had more than just two keys with him. I heard a small jingling sound coming from his pocket when he put his hand back, so I knew he did have more than two.

Rex smiled over at me as she walked away. I blushed at the look in his eye, but turned away quickly. I didn't need to like him; I just needed him to consider me a friend. That was all. I didn't think I needed anything more.

Rex must have noticed this, because he turned away also, seeming a bit discouraged. I hated that I had to hurt him, so I turned back to him and asked, "How long do you think it'll take them to figure out that you do have three keys, and we still have the right one?"

Rex turned back to me, smiled, and answered, "By the looks of it, I'd say quite a while. It seems to me that Max gets dumber every day. But Zoe might figure it out a little sooner than him. Eventually."

I looked up at the now darkening sky. I felt a light breeze blow over my skin. I looked over at Rex as the wind continued to ruffle my hair. The way the coil of air blew through his hair made me grin, and the way the bare moonlight reflected off his eyes made me blush. He was probably the cutest boy I'd ever seen.

"Come on in guys!" Mrs. Taylor called from inside the house; it wasn't much of an angry command, more like just a commanding-ish suggestion. But with someone that nice, you'd do anything she asked you with a smile. "It's getting late!"

Rex and I walked side by side to the door after having been called, where we saw that Zoe and Max were still trying to figure out why the heck neither or the keys would work. It was honestly the most pathetic thing I'd ever watched for ten minutes.

"Sorry Mom!" Max shouted back to her through the closed glass door. I was surprised that he hadn't just asked her to open it for us from the inside. Maybe it was just one of those dumb doors. Or just one of those dumb people. "It's kinda hard to get into the house when it's locked."

Rex pulled out the—apparently—only correct key, and said to Max and Zoe, a nonchalant expression on his face and in his tone, "Why don't you try this one?" I smiled at his calm and simple way of saying, 'You're so stupid'.

Zoe scowled at him and took the key, only to find that it was the right one. _Like Rex would've been wrong about a key._ She handed all three keys back to Rex—which I thought was kinda stupid on her part, then he could do it again—and followed Max inside; I snickered at her angry expression. Rex and I walked into the house after the last baby dinosaur.

Max fell asleep as soon as he got into his room—seriously, as soon as he got into his room. He didn't even make it to his bed. Just…fell over asleep as soon as one foot went through the doorway.

"Is this all normal?" I questioned Rex as we both stared at Zoe as she attempted to drag Max to his bed. She was failing miserably and it was frickin' hilarious. I wasn't about to help at all; that would ruin all the fun!

"Depends on what you mean by normal I guess," Rex replied with a sly glance and grin. "For Max, this is every night he stays outside for a while. For Zoe, she's always yelling at us about something. I guess you kinda get used to it after a while." I could tell he wasn't just kidding around; I beamed back genuinely.

I looked back over at Max and Zoe. I was surprised to see that Zoe had actually gotten Max into his bed. She didn't seem to be strong enough by any means to be able to actually lift the guy. Or even have the guts to touch him; who knew where that guy had been?

"I'd better get home." Zoe told us panting. Heh, I guess it had been hard for her to lift that triceratop's horn-visor-thingy person…guy. _Sheesh, it's hard to come up with a good-ish sounding but somehow insulting name for that guy. But, I guess the more it doesn't make sense, the more insulting to him it is._

"When were you planning on us going shopping?" I asked her, sorta—actually completely—dreading her answer. I was hoping with every single part of my being that she would say, 'What are you talking about? Shopping? No way!' But I knew that wouldn't happen. I wasn't that lucky at all.

"Uhh, how about the day after tomorrow?—" _You mean Tuesday? Oh crap…I'm free that day…I hate you Tuesday…_ "My parents want me to go with them to this one vet expo thing or something tomorrow. That okay with you?"

"Yeah, sure." I replied with a forced smile, relief that I got one entire day to try and hurt myself so she couldn't drag me along detectable in my voice. Maybe I could find a way to the roof, jump off, and break my leg. She couldn't bring me if I couldn't walk.

Zoe smiled back at me, nodded her head, walked past Rex and I, and started heading for the front door. I shook my head as I wondered how the heck these people could hang out with her and not completely lose their minds. I was beginning to wonder where the heck mine was going. _I'm going to the one place she'll never be: Antarctica. Call me when you've killed her, or you leave. Either way, I'm not coming back till she's dead._

Rex smiled and told me, like he knew what I was thinking, "Don't worry, you'll get used to it eventually." _Great, one more reason why Rex can read minds: he knows I'm planning to go to Antarctica, and kill Zoe from afar. Hopefully he's smart enough not to warn her._

I smiled back at him, and then said, "Well, we'll see about that now won't we? But uhh…I guess, I'll talk to you more tomorrow." I started backing up slowly, heading for the room where I'd be staying (a.k.a. the couch).

"Yeah, I guess so too…good-night Rante." Rex answered me in his quiet manner as he turned slightly towards his room. He didn't seem in a big hurry to get to sleep; it was as if there was something he wanted to do beforehand.

"Good-night." I blushed lightly as I turned away from him and nearly sprinted for the living room. I didn't think it would really be a good idea to actually run for it, because that might give the wrong impression. But then just meandering would make me nervous, and then I'd fall on my face and just prolong all the embarrassment.

As soon as I got there to the living room, I leaned against the wall and slid to the floor. I didn't know what was going on inside me right now, or really at any time during this day at all; nothing like this had ever happened to me before. How was I going to complete the mission if I didn't know what was going on in the first place?

I sat there on the floor thinking about Rex for almost an hour before I got up, walked over to the couch and laid down. I crossed my arms behind my head, and stared up at the ceiling for a few minutes, thinking about nothing in particular, just letting my mind wander in Antarctica as it pleased. I had no idea I'd fallen asleep, but when I did, it was too late to stop even if I'd wanted to in the first place.


	3. Chapter 3

**Sorry it's been taking so long for me to upload these. When I do get on the PC to work on it, it's slow going, and besides that, I've been working on two others that I've been having a more inspirational time with, so I've been working on them. I hope you like what I have got for this though. :)**

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Chapter 3-

"Rante! Rante! Rante! Rante! Get up!" Max was yelling in my ear. I groaned and tried to roll over to get away from him, but he just grabbed my arm, flipped me over again and kept on shouting.

Yeah, that's what I woke up to.

"What?!" I yelled back at him, breathing heavily. You'd be kinda scared too if he was screaming his head off in your ear. For a minute there I was thinking that he'd set the house on and fire and he had to be the new smoke detector because he obliterated the original one.

He was silent for a minute, like he forgot what he was going to say. If he'd woken me up for absolutely nothing, just to forget what that nothing was, I was going to kill him until he was dead. Then apparently he remembered, so he told me, "I wanted to show you my cooking skills by cooking you breakfast."

"What cooking skills could you possibly have?" I asked, annoyed he'd woken me up the way he had. If I still wasn't so tired, I would've shoved his head through a wall or something. But then again, the wall was way the heck over there…

A sheepish smile crossed his face as he answered me, his tone telling me that he did not care that I had the choice of saying no. I knew that even if I did say there was no way I was going to eat something he'd cooked, he'd force it down my throat anyway. "Well, Rex and Zoe say I have no skill, but I want to know what you think."

I sighed with exasperation of the idiot before me; if I didn't have to be friends with this guy, I probably would've kicked him in the crotch and told him to never wake me up again if he liked life at all. "Alright, fine, whatever." I replied yawning; I wondered what time it was anyway.

"Come on," He said as he grabbed my arm and began dragging me into the kitchen. "I want you to rate my work too." _But what if I don't wanna rate your work? And guess what? I don't. Now let my arm go, and I'm going back to sleep._

But he didn't let me go, so I just replied with another yawn. If I yawned enough, maybe he'd let me go sleep again, or maybe he'd just leave me alone for the rest of the time I was here. A person could hope, couldn't they?

Rex walking out of the bathroom with a towel around his waist, and rubbing his hair with another towel woke me up though. I stopped and stared at him as he walked back to his room. I gulped; that image of him was never going to leave my mind. I shook my head in an attempt of clearing my head as I continued following Max to the kitchen.

As I walked into the kitchen, Max started blabbering on and on to me that even though he was a 'good cook' he'd burned everything he'd ever tried to make. He told me that one time he'd made a Twinkie explode in the microwave because he thought it looked at him funny. I snickered when he told me about the time he'd accidentally spilled boiling water on Zoe.

Rex walked casually into the room, fully dressed this time (bummer), but still rubbing his hair with the towel. I wondered if he had that new you'll-never-ever-be-able-to-get-rid-of-me-ha-ha water. I'd heard it didn't like going away.

"Geez Rex, how dry does your hair need to be?" Max asked as he began throwing entire eggs into a blender. I wondered to myself if he knew he was supposed to crack the eggs and just let the yoke fall into the pan—in this case, blender.

"Not my fault my hair soaks up water like a sponge," Rex replied, glaring at him as he finished drying his hair. "And don't even think about trying to dry it faster with a torch again. I still have the burn from the last time when you got bored, forgot what you were doing, and threw it at me."

I grinned at the mental imagery that Rex had started in my mind. And at Rex himself. He noticed me smile at him, and sent the weird smile he'd given me when we met my way. It was a smile of…well, it was a smile that was impossible to describe, but it could've made anyone feel spiffy inside.

When I looked over at Max, I saw he was still putting the whole carton of eggs into the blender. Shell and all. He picked up the blender, and put it down on one of the stove burners. He put the cover on the blender, turned it on, and then turned the stove on high.

I yawned again, even though I was kinda looking forward to seeing how this would turn out. Rex noticed me yawn, and asked me with a sympathetic smile on his face, "Exactly how early did Max wake you up?"

I looked back over at him and replied saying, "I don't know, five or six minutes before you got out of the shower." I blushed a deep crimson as I remembered the drops of water rolling down Rex's chest. I knew that picture wasn't going to leave me alone.

I quickly shook my head, trying hopelessly to get the images of him out of my head. But it was a battle that I knew he had the advantage in. He was cute, I had to admit that. This couldn't be anything more than just a bit of infatuation. Nothing more.

"What do you want to do today guys?" Max asked as he pulled a chair up near the stove to watch the blender obliterate the eggshells. "Zoe, her parents and all of the baby dinosaurs are at that vet expo thing, who knows why she took the dinosaurs."

"Uhh, I don't know." I replied with a bit of a shrug. I hadn't expected that they'd wanna do something. Originally I'd been planning to work out a plan to get their Dino Holders. But I guess that wasn't how it was going to go anymore. So, I passed the buck to Rex. "Rex, got any ideas?"

"I don't know; we could kick the soccer ball around outside for a while or something." Rex suggested with a shrug of his shoulders. He didn't really seem to care if we did anything or not; he probably would've rathered check to make sure Chomp didn't take one of his books along as a snack.

"Sure, let's go," Max replied spunkily as he jumped up out of the chair like a little hoppity little rabbit. "I'm game for soccer anytime!" He grabbed a pink soccer ball out of nowhere and ran for the back door, emphasizing his point on 'anytime'.

"Wait!" Rex called after him, his voice holding a bit more concern than I would've thought 'cause of the…uh, topic he choose so shout after Max about. "What about your…uhh, 'cooking'?"

Max stopped before he ran into the sliding glass door and looked back at Rex and the stove. But he just shrugged and replied before—to my surprise—opening the door and running through it to the natural air outside. "Eh, it'll be fine, now come on, let's go!"

Rex glanced at the stove, but just shrugged his shoulders, so I figured we may as well just leave it and hope for the best. We both followed Max outside, being careful not to run into the door and give to ourselves the name of 'moron'. And besides, I didn't want to leave a smudge on Mrs. Taylor's glass door.

When we got outside and located where Max had run off to, we saw him running around in a circle screaming, with some cloud-like thing chasing after him. I let out a slightly nervous laugh when I figured out what the cloud was. A swarm of bees, obviously a bit ticked off at Max.

Rex was about to run over and help him, but I stuck my arm out, blocking him from going anywhere. Rex looked at me with a slightly outraged and confused expression as he exclaimed, "What are you doi—"

I interrupted him saying, "I can handle this; I don't want you to get hurt." My words stunned me because I hadn't planned on saying that last part, and I really didn't even know where it came from in the first place.

But this didn't seem to bother Rex in the least bit. His face turned a very light pink, and he smiled at me. I was getting to like that smile. Then he asked, "How exactly are you going to handle this?"

"Just wait here." I replied as I walked over to Max and the bees. Mainly the bees, Max was running too fast for even Speedy Gonzales to catch up to him. Even to just give a triangular slice of cheese or something.

When I got over there, Max was too busy yelling and running around in circles to notice me standing there, but the bees did. They drifted slowly over to me through the calm as if they were a kid walking over to his parents when he knew they knew he'd done something bad. I was only doing this—knowing it wasn't exactly safe—because I was a bit of a bee person. Once I'd stashed a bee hive under Ursula's bed 'cause I got a little bored. That week sure went by slow.

They kinda hovered near me as I smiled at them, and held out my hand. Two of them landed in my hand; I had a feeling they were the ones who had started the attack on Max. I couldn't help but be kinda proud of them, despite the fact that I barely even knew the bees here (this sounds really weird in my head). I gave them a light toss, and they all flew off, while Max continued running around in a circle screaming his head off.

Rex walked up to me, his mouth hanging open. For a second I wondered why, then I kinda remembered that it wasn't normal for a person to be able to do that kind of a thing without a really big, menacing-looking flyswatter.

"How did you do that?" Rex asked in an awed tone, his mouth still hanging open. I was slightly surprised that he was this stupefied by what I'd done. I did this all the time; no one who watched had ever acted like he was right now.

I smiled, shrugged my shoulders and answered, "What can I say? I guess I'm just a bee whisperer." I could still hear the distant buzzing of those bees over the sound of the breeze, but I could care less about them now. Rex was standing right there in front of me now.

He gave me an impressed smile; I blushed and turned my head away from him. Max hadn't stopped screaming, so I stuck out my foot and tripped him. That's usually a last resort kind of way to shut someone up, but one way is better than having no ideas at all.

"What was that for?!" Max shouted at me while glaring with anger for me and a newfound fear of bees in his eyes and his facial expression. He covered his head and looked around for the bees. "Now they're gonna get me!"

"Do you see any bees anywhere?" I asked him, trying to keep my cool. It wasn't that easy to stay calm and not yell back when someone who was barely smarter than half a stone was shouting at you about bees and how evil they apparently were.

He looked around him slowly, being careful to make sure that I wasn't just kidding around about them being gone. Ha, like I'd do that. No, wait, never mind. That does sound a lot like me.

"Well…where did they go?" he asked, seeming a bit upset about them being gone. I was a bit surprised at first, but then raised my hand to a snapping position and grinned mischievously at him.

"Do you want me to call them back?" I asked with a small smirk twinkling on my face. Did I think they'd come back if I tried to get them to: No. Did Max or anyone else in the world that could actually hear this current conversation: Nope. So, why not?

"No, no, no." Max said as he got up from laying down on his stomach to a sitting position. He sat pretzel-legged on the ground as he looked around. "I just want to know why they left all of a sudden."

"Rante got them to leave you alone." Rex told him, still smiling in that strange yet somehow interestingly curious and kinda sorta cute way he had. "You should thank her. You had them pretty angry."

I blushed again in Rex's direction, but I turned away and looked out across the clear blue sky before he got the chance to see. His smiling at me was making me nervous. I didn't get it, but that didn't seem to matter. It made me anxious, and that was that.

"Alright, thanks Rante," He said as he got up and suddenly began sprinting for the house. Hopefully we hadn't locked ourselves outside. I don't think Mrs. Taylor would appreciate us getting in again by breaking a window. "Oh! That reminds me…"

I gave Max a weird look as he dashed quickly inside the house. It was one of those looks that say, 'What the heck is wrong with you? Actually, never mind. I take that back. I don't think I even want to know'. Rex noticed the expression, smiled again, and reminded me, "His 'cooking'."

I let a small laugh out; I cast a smile at him before turning and starting towards the house to see what had happened with Max and his 'cooking'. Rex followed swiftly after me.

When we got into the kitchen, I smelled smoke, and saw Max with the fire extinguisher. White foam covered the stove. Rex face palmed while I continued to stare at the nearly smoldering kitchen.

"I knew I shouldn't have let you keep doing that." Rex said to Max, who was now having a hard time figuring out how the fire extinguisher worked in the first place, even though he'd already gotten it to work when he needed it.

"But it worked this time." Max said as he put the fire extinguisher down and took the melted blender off of the stove. The eggs were completely burned, and melted in with the plastic. He looked at it again with a stupid smile on his face. "Okay, maybe it didn't. But you have to admit, I'm a creative cooker."

Rex rolled his eyes and I laughed. Max gave us a weird smile, like he knew something we didn't. I looked at him as if I were asking, _"What are you thinking?" _But he just kept the smile on his face, showing no sign of giving me a hint of what was in his mind. He was smarter than I thought. Strange.

We went back outside and kicked the soccer ball around for a couple of hours. I was kind of surprised that we did that for as long as we had though. And we probably would've gone longer if Max hadn't popped the ball. For some reason he wanted to know if he could eat it and he tried. The only reason Rex and I made no move to stop him, was because we both wanted to see how this would actually turn out.

Yeah, we probably should've stopped him.

"You guys want to go and find something else to do? It's kinda hard to kick around a flat soccer ball." Rex said to us as he prodded the ball with the toe of his shoe. I wondered what would happen if a squirrel stole it sometime during the night.

We headed back inside, Max dragging the airless soccer ball behind him. So much for the squirrel stealing it in the middle of the frickin' night. Now all of the wool land creatures will have nothing to do but eat nuts and climb trees. And attack each other.

"Wasn't that Zoe's soccer ball?" I asked while sitting upside-down in one of the chairs. There really wasn't anything else to do besides have a staring contest, but Rex was reading, and Max kept blinking no matter how hard I tried to teach him that you can't blink in a staring contest.

"Yeah, the third one that Max popped this week. She's going to kill him." Rex said, shaking his head in pity for his visor-wearing friend. I couldn't help but snicker. I was an interesting mental picture to…uh, mentally picture.

"Who's going to kill who now?"

Zoe was standing in the doorway. All of the baby dinosaurs streamed in before her in a little miniature stampede. It would've really been a stampede if Zoe had been crushed like a lady bug underneath all of them. It would've been really funny too.

"_You_ are going to kill _Max_." I told her with a forced smile. Although, she wasn't worth me talking to her right side-up, so I stayed put. Barely even breathing. _Don't move. It can't see you if you don't move…_ "And speaking of you, you're back early."

"Why am I going to kill him exactly?" She asked with a slightly confused look on her face as she sat down on the opposite side of the couch from Rex. Her voice took a dive to an annoyed one when she mentioned why she was back when she was however. "And yes, we are back early. We got kicked out of the vet expo thingy because of _them_." She pointed over at Ace and Aza.

"What did they do?" Rex asked with a sudden tauntingly rough tone to his voice. It made me smile. "And didn't we tell you that whenever you have them with you, to actually watch them?"

"I was so watching them! I just don't know what they actually did. But when they came back, Ace had a proud little smirk on his face, so I'm thinking that it was all his idea." Zoe ran through her theory as if it were her middle name. All the while the rest of the dinosaurs just kinda stood there and stared.

I looked over at Ace; he had an innocent look on his face. _Yeah, it was his idea alright. Besides, Aza can't come up with stuff superly fast, so, that only leaves him. Or, maybe it was all Chomp's idea, and he just framed them. Nah, let's just go on ahead and blame Paris._

Noticing something that hadn't been there this morning when she left, Zoe picked up the flattened soccer ball. With a sudden burst of anger-energy, she started chasing Max around the house, yelling at him for flattening it. I guess she kinda just figured that he was the one who popped it. Who else would've?

I rolled my eyes as I thought to myself, _"They like each other." _I smiled; it was impossible not to see. It was clearer than the puffy white cloud-filled sky today. Or a peanut butter jar once you take all the sticky goodness and lick the jar clean.

"They like each other, don't they?" I asked, turning to face Rex, a small smirk on my face. I could see him struggle to hold back a smile behind his book. But it was too powerful a grin, and it showed nevertheless.

He blushed a light pink that reminded me of the color of a cherry blossom because of the topic of my choice and replied, his voice quiet as not to make the two aware of the conversation, "Yeah, I think they've liked each other for a while now."

We both grew quiet, while Max and Zoe did everything but that. I heard something crash, and was about to get up to check it out, but Rex gave a small shake of his head that I took as, 'If you go to see what they're doing, Zoe's probably gonna start chasing you around with a bat too.' So I relaxed in the chair again and listened to them screaming, and Rex's quiet breathing as he read. That and the occasional flipping of a page.

Max and Zoe suddenly stopped yelling. I perked up at the sudden silence, and swerved around in the chair, returning to a normal not upside-down position. I got up out of the chair, and began walking out of the room. Curiosity was getting the best of me despite what Rex had told me was a good and/or bad idea to do. I wanted to know why they shut up so suddenly.

I eventually found them in Max's room, sitting on his bed…kissing. This was honestly the last thing I'd expected. I thought that Zoe had just killed Max or something and was wondering if she really had done so or not. Guess not.

I blinked a few times and rubbed my eyes, unsure of whether or not this was actually real. When I figured out that it was, I backed away from the door, and walked back down the hall to the living room. I sat down next to Rex in an almost involuntary kind of way. Like I was sleep walking or something.

Rex noticed the bizarre look on my face, so he asked me with a bit of a slow weariness to his usually confident tone, "What are they doing…or do I not even want to know?"

"They're…they're just kissing." I told him quietly, embarrassed to have had to be the one to tell him that; I blushed a dark red as I imagined Rex and me in their shoes. Doing what they were.

Rex's cheeks turned a bright, almost unnoticeable pink. I guess he had imagined the same thing. I wondered if he wanted to do the same thing I wanted to right now. By the look on his face…I had a 50% chance that he did.

I cast him a sideways glance, taking in the true beauty of his deep blue eyes; there was no other color like it in the rainbow. May've even had its own personal rainbow. You never know with rainbows and spectacular colors that take your breath away.

We were both quiet…until that is I finally turned to Rex after he broke the awkward silence. "Uh…Rante?" His voice was softer than cotton, and blew through the still air like an ocean breeze billows the sails of a ship.

I continued to look at him without having to face him. I didn't want him to see me blushing. "Yes? What Rex?" My voice sounded hoarse and nervous, like the only thing I wanted to do right then was get away. But I didn't want to, I liked it. Despite the fact I was shaking.

I was sure that this was going to turn into one of those little pieces of time that you call by a special name because it is indeed extraordinary. You'd call it a moment. And this moment was ruined by our DinoHolders going off, and my cell phone ringing right after them.

I mumbled something I made sure Rex didn't hear as I got up from where I'd been sitting and walked into the hallway. Just because I felt like saying a couple of things that weren't necessary, that didn't mean he had to hear them too.

I answered the phone with a snap that clearly showed my current mood for anyone that wasn't able to notice all of the erupting volcanoes, "What could you possibly need this time?" If no one had noticed, I was a bit pissed off.

"Rante," It was Rod. Of course it was him. No one else would dare call when that vibe that said, 'Pick up that phone and call me, and I swear to God that I will shoot you till you're dead' would pick up the phone…and call me. "A dinosaur's been brought out of its card. You have to go get it."

"Yes, thank you Captain for that tiny bit of obvious information," I spat into the mouthpiece. If he couldn't hear that I was ticked, he wasn't listening to me at all. "I already knew that."

"Oh, okay. And by the way, who put you in the sour mood this time? Max getting on your nerves, or was it Zoe?" I could tell he was smirking. Smirking like the smug little bug that he was. He'd better be glad I wasn't there to pick him up and give him to some bird or something.

"…It's not important right now." I hung up the phone on him, not wanting the conversation to continue right now. If it did, I might end up throwing the phone against the wall and repeatedly jumping on it as soon as it hit solid ground.

I didn't want my already pissed off mood to get any worse. But with Max and Zoe here, it wasn't going to be easy to keep it on the down low. Especially if they kept up being as loud as they were. I could hear them from at least halfway through the house. The neighbors probably thought that someone was being barbequed or something.

I walked back to the living room; Max, Zoe, and Rex were arguing about where the dinosaur was by the time I got there. Rex kept telling them it was in Egypt, but they refused to believe him, and kept trying to convince him it was in Scotland.

I leaned over Rex's shoulder, and took a look at the map on his DinoHolder. I didn't really feel like taking mine out of my pocket right now. I'd already known that Rex would be right. The hard part would be convincing Max and Zoe that he was right.

"Guys, Rex is right, it's in Egypt." I tried to tell them, but they wouldn't believe me. I sighed, walked out of the room, and came back with a book. I paged through it until I found a map of the world similar to the one the DinoHolders were programmed with. Seriously, what's the point of a map, if you can't tell the difference between Scotland and Egypt?

I pointed out which country was Scotland, and then which Egypt was, and proved to them that it was in Egypt. This was something you needed to do for little children, not these people. At least I could hope they might get smarter eventually. _Hope as much as you want that doesn't mean they'll be any smarter than a pot. _"…Oh." They mumbled in unison when they realized I was right; I rolled my eyes in annoyance.

"So, how are we actually going to get there?" I asked them, a smile crossing my face as I imagined having to walk there. _Yeah, Max trying to walk on water. How the heck are you doing that Max?! A lot of practice I guess! Haha!_

Yeah, like I knew how the heck they got around.

"We could walk, or take the jet." Max suggested. I wasn't sure if he was kidding about the walking part or not. I expected that he was and cracked a smile to humor him. It was the least I could do; I was supposed to be their friend anyway.

Zoe seemed to be the one who didn't want to get any exercise today besides chasing Max around the house trying to kill him, then taking a break from that by kissing him. Yeah, that's the only normal way to burn some calories! "I think we should take the jet."

"Actually, I kinda want to walk there." Max told us with a truthful look on his happy-go-lucky face. I could tell he wasn't lying just by that expression. That and the fact that if you knew Max for at least three and a half seconds, you'd know that would be something he'd want to do.

"…Got speed shoes?" I questioned, mainly joking with him, but his 'thinking' expression told me he really took it as an actual question. I came close to face palming, but stopped myself and waited to see what Max would say in reply to that anyway.

Max turned to Rex and started poking him as he questioned, repeating his words faster and faster until Rex decided to finally reply. But that took quite a while, so then I had what Max had kept saying stuck in my head for the rest of the frickin' day: "…Rex, can you make speed shoes?"

"What do you think?" Rex cast him a 'What the heck?' kind of glance as he answered his question with a completely separate question. Although, this was probably the most enjoyable conversation that had gone on between everybody since I'd gotten here.

After a little while of pondering what he could and should say, Max let out a small, obviously disappointment-awaiting sigh and replied, "…No, I don't have speed shoes." He seemed quite sad about that.

"Then we're taking the jet, sorry Max." I said with a sly smile. I didn't really mean that apology, and I was pretty sure he knew that; I could tell by the slight glare he was sending me. But I could tell that he was trying to hold back a smile. He'd liked talking about speed shoed also.

He scowled at me as he got up from the chair he was in, and started walking away. Zoe followed him. Rex had started to walk away, but he noticed my hesitation, so he walked back over to me, took my hand, and started walking away. I blushed; he didn't have to do that, I would've followed eventually. But I guess I really didn't care, because I let my hand stay in his.

We came into a large room with a fair amount of valuable looking technology in it. With my luck, I probably would've broken something if I hadn't put my free hand in my back pocket. Rex took me over to Max and Zoe, who were talking with a blonde haired woman.

"Hello Rex. Oh, who's this?" She asked him, her eyes now locked on me. Her face reminded me of Zoe's; not the hair however. Hers was moreover a normal color, while Zoe's was an eye-burning pink. Despite that small factor, they could've been sisters. But I wasn't about to ask; it really didn't matter to me, nor did it concern me.

"Hi Reese, this is a new friend of ours. She's going to be staying with us. Her name's Rante." Rex answered as he sent a warm smile my way; you'd think I'd get used to that since he'd been doing that all day long, but that was something you never got used to. Like the feeling of being burned up by lava. You only got to feel that once if you were lucky, and you could never get used to how it felt.

"Max and I think they like each other!" Zoe exclaimed in a seemingly uncontrollable outburst. She immediately covered her mouth afterwards, and Max shot her a look that said, 'Say another word and you're not coming with. Even if we need 'hair tips'.'

"We do not!" Rex and I shouted at them in unison. I glared at both Max and Zoe, my nostrils flaring and my teeth and fists clenched. If they said one more thing about that…I was gonna tear one of their arms off, and hit the other one with it. I didn't know what Rex was planning on doing, but that didn't matter as long as I got to whack someone with an arm.

"Then explain why you're holding hands." Max probed with a look of satisfied mockery on his stupid visor-wearing head. I wanted to punch that guy so bad right now. He was smarter and more annoying then I'd thought. Impressive.

Rex and I blushed, and let go of each others hand. I shoved both of my hands in my pockets and looked anywhere but at Rex. This wasn't going well at all; how had this thing happened again? Because I couldn't seem to remember where it all fell off a cliff in the middle of the neighborhood.

Reese nodded her head, apparently confused at which side to believe. She apparently made her choice after a while because she asked, ignoring the fact that this probably had nothing to do with the current conversation that had just happened, "What do you guys need?"

Max started out with the explaining, and I was honestly surprised that he knew what he was talking about. And that he'd used to correct name of the place we'd decided the dinosaur was at. "Another dinosaur was brought out of its card in Egypt, and we—"

"You need a ride there?" Reese cut him off, getting right to the simple point in a matter of three seconds with five words and a question mark or two. It wasn't impressive to have figured out what we wanted, but I gave her credit for reading Max's mind. It took a pretty brave person to go in _there_.

"Yeah, that might help a bit." I answered with a small smile; if I was supposed to be befriending the D-Team—I could only assume that she was either part of it, or she worked for them or something—I may as well be nice to her too. It just made some sense to me.

"No problem," She stood up from the chair she'd been sitting in, and started heading for the car outside. I was slightly astonished that she was going to take us there now, and without any hesitation about bringing me along. Unless she thought Max and Zoe were planning to throw me out the side of the plane. Hopefully, they weren't smart enough to figure out that that would work. And hopefully Rex wouldn't let them.

Reese pulled a ring of keys out of the pocket of her long white lab coat, and jangled them a bit, gesturing for us to hurry up and get in the car before she changed her mind and decided to leave us all behind. "Let's go get the jet."


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4-

I seemed to be the only one who had absolutely no idea of where we were going—which I got a bit annoyed about, mostly 'cause Zoe kept looking back and asking if I'd gotten lost yet—so I walked close to Rex as we headed for the right jet—which I didn't mind.

Zoe nearly knocked Max over a few times because of Ace and Aza running around our little group like crazy aiming to trip us, but every now and then Zoe would complain they were really trying to kill one of us. But they would _never_ do _that_. Hopefully.

Some pilot dude stopped us and started talking with Reese for a fair amount of time though, so, I kinda figured that this was gonna take longer than I'd originally hoped. I passed the time by talking to Zoe (no idea why I thought that would be a way to spend it, but alright). And I learned that we both had a feeling that Reese and that dude liked each other.

I laughed at Zoe's impression of what Reese's feeling's face might have looked like as she talked with the guy. This seemed like one of the only times we would get along. And I was pretty sure I'd learn that it would be.

When we finally got to the jet, it seemed a lot quieter for some reason. But I paid no mind to it. But then I just had to notice that we'd left Max, Zoe, Chomp, and Paris on the ground. Sure it would've been just fine to leave them there, but I couldn't stop myself before I mentioned it. "Uhh, does it seem strangely quiet in here to anybody? Or is it just me?"

Reese laughed a little bit before questioning me, it was like she could frickin' read my mind or something…and it was just kinda creepy to say the very least, "We left Max, Chomp, Paris, and Zoe on the ground, didn't we?" _Well, that sure is a mouth-full, isn't it?_

"Yeah, but that doesn't mean we have to go get them. I kinda like the peaceful silence. I can finally hear my own thoughts." I suggested; I really did enjoy being able to hear the silence, besides Aza and Ace. They were having one of their little 'contests' again—the only rule was that you couldn't stop making noise under penalty of nothing. I knew Max and Zoe would be able to find something to occupy themselves with until we came back.

But no, Reese took the jet back down. Then she asked Rex and me to go and try to find them when we got to the ground. I sighed silently; not only did we not get to leave them behind, but I had to be one of the people to go and find them again. Of course.

Finally I caved into Reese's reassuring that having them with us wouldn't be as bad as I thought it was, and followed Rex out of the jet and down around the hangars again. We walked side-by-side as we started our search for Max, Zoe and the dinosaurs; Aza and Ace ran out a few feet ahead of us.

I smiled, happy to see Aza having as much fun and being as happy as she was. I'd never seen her this happy—then again, I'd barely known her, but it still felt like I had always known her. I could only assume that it would be hard to get her to leave when I completed the mission.

The smile faded from my face in an instant. The mission; I'd completely forgotten it, and the fact that Seth would be pretty pissed if I didn't finish it up fast. I'd been busy with everything but figuring out the mission. How was I going to go through with it when I was becoming more of a true friend to them during every minute I spent here?

I hadn't noticed that I'd had an almost depressed-like look on my face until Rex asked me about it. I wished that I'd just been holding it in better; this wasn't a very good time to be talking about crap like this. "What's wrong? You look upset."

I glanced over at him; a small smile wanted to cross my face, but I refused to let it. It was no lie that he cared for me, all he wanted to do was make me feel better, in any way that he could. But that didn't help with the fact that I needed to 'betray' him in order to make Seth proud. Or at least the least bit pleased. Was Seth worth leaving that though?

I wanted to tell Rex the truth, I really did. I wished I could tell him about everything. I wanted him to know about the Alpha Gang: The mission. Everything he didn't know about me. What I was here for. Who I really was. How I felt.

But the fear of a negative answer made me have a need to have to lie again. Something I just didn't want to do to Rex. I wouldn't rathered just jump in front of a moving bus right now and avoid the mission, and lying to Rex. But there was no bus here, and it would probably stop before it was too late anyways.

I didn't see a safer path to take, so I made up an excuse, "It's nothing, just not exactly looking forward to having to go shopping with Zoe." It was a poor excuse, I knew it was, but it was all I could think of on such short notice. It was partly true though.

I turned my head to face the ground as he answered, his voice sounding slightly surprised at my reply, "Oh," I could tell he knew that wasn't the whole story. "Don't worry, it won't be as bad as you may think it will be, just…don't let it get to you. I know for a fact you're strong enough to keep it under control."

He couldn't see through my tough exterior—to my knowledge, he didn't have x-ray vision. Inside I was weak, stupid even. Nothing I did ever seemed to be the right thing to have done or said. This mission was only one example. How could I do this when I felt this way about Rex?

My confusing and complicated thoughts were interrupted again by Rex asking me with a hushed concern to his tone and his expression, "But that's not all that's bugging you, is it?" _I wish people would just say that right off the bat so ya don't have to go through this awkward feeling of silence._

I turned my head from the ground to him again; I didn't want him to see the tears of anger towards Seth and confused emotions that wouldn't let me fess up like I wanted to. He stopped walking and turned his whole body to face me when he saw my hesitations.

I turned away from him more. _Don't let him see you cry, don't let him see you cry…_I tried to answer with a strong, unwavering voice, but that didn't happen at all. My voice sounded like I'd just shattered as I said weakly, "…No…That isn't it…But I don't want to talk about it anyways…"

Rex took my hand in his again—_Man I wish he wouldn't do that. Why do his hands have to be so warm and spiffy and stuff?_—and pulled me around to face him as he pleaded, "Rante, tell me what's wrong. I only want to help." He took my other hand in his in an effort to keep me facing him.

All I knew was that I couldn't tell him how I felt, or who I really was; I just couldn't. How was I going to know if he would understand? Nevertheless…I sighed, giving in to my want to tell him despite knowing—sorta—the consequences. "It's just that…I—"

I was cut off by Max and Zoe running towards us, both of them screaming their heads off like some crazy killer-dude was coming after them at snail-miles-per-hour. _…This is new…_ Rex let go of one of my hands, but he kept the other the same, maybe he thought this would give himself a bit of a foothold when I was ready to start talking. That was by no means going to happen today though.

Max was screaming for someone to keep Zoe away from him, and Zoe was yelling at Max to stop running so she could punch him. _I wonder if Max ate one of Zoe's soccer balls thinking it was round cotton candy. I seriously wouldn't put it past the guy. I mean, look at the way he runs. It's like he's ready to fall on his face with every step. At least he's got his hair for a pillow to land on. _

Max stopped in front of Rex, and turned around to face Zoe as she threw a punch at him. That just seemed plain dumb to me; if you're running away from someone, the only reason you should look back is to check if they're still there, and even then that's a stupid idea. That or you forgot why you were running in the first place.

Max ducked; Rex flinched; he didn't have enough time to react. But I did. I quickly moved my palm in front of his face, catching Zoe's fist before it collided with Rex's mouth. I tossed it back down to her side. They all stood in awe at how quickly I'd reacted. Did I know how I did that? No, but it had seemed like the right thing to do at the moment, so…why not?

I felt a burning sensation concealed in my palm; I knew Zoe's nails had cut my skin, I knew there was a chance I was bleeding, but I didn't care. I could've cared less about the pain; it was better than Rex getting a punch in the mouth for no reason other than Zoe's poor aim and bad calculation of time.

"We should get back to the jet," Rex stated, glaring angrily at Zoe for having nearly punched him in the face, and—I could tell by the glint in his eye—for hurting me. How he could tell I'll never know, but he could, and that set me to wondering about ESP. "Reese is waiting."

"Wait," Max stopped us before we could turn around to head back to the jet, an evil smirk was plastered securely to his face as he eyed our hands. I hated it so much when that somehow-smart expression crossed his features. "Why are you guys holding hands, again?"

We both blushed a light shade of pink before letting go of each others hand again. _If people couldn't talk, this kind of crap just wouldn't happen to anyone._ We turned around and started heading for the jet again: Max and Zoe walked after us, snickering and laughing uncontrollably as they walked. I had a very good idea of what they were talking about.

When we finally got back to the jet the _second_ time, we made sure we had everyone (Rex counted, and miscounted at least four and a half times), and took off again. I had to admit, I regretted agreeing to come here in the first place; quite frankly I'd rather be back at the Taylor's trying to scarf down those 'eggs' Max had 'cooked'.

Max and Zoe yelled and screamed at each other practically the whole time, and for pretty much no reason besides the fact that they could, would, and shouldn't. Rex and I were getting sick of it by the second minute that passed by. I could feel my headache getting a migraine.

"Okay, I agree with you, we should've left them there." Rex told me with a small smile on his face, trying to brighten the mood with a joke wasn't my first thought, but then again I'd been trying to block out all thinking in the first place. I could tell that Rex was getting a headache-migraine from their arguing too. When one person has a headache, it's pretty easy to tell when someone else does because you know what you look like when you've got a really bad one.

When I didn't think I could take their yelling much more without exploding into a million itty bitty pieces that Max might just choke on, I turned around and shouted over both of their extremely annoying and whiny voices, "Okay, what the heck are you fighting about?!"

"Max won't admit birds can't fly!" Zoe squealed as she pointed her finger at Max, who didn't hesitate one moment to bite it. I had to admit, that was a good one. I hadn't expected anything like that to cross Max's mind. But then again, it didn't take very long to get across that place because there wasn't anything there that you needed to go over or around.

I stared at them; Rex face palmed. I could barely believe _that's_ what they were fighting about. But, it was Max and Zoe I was talking about, so it wasn't exactly that hard to believe. And I guess it wasn't really what they were fighting about that I needed to know, it was just the fact that they would stop if I figured out a solution to their problem. _Duct tape! That wicked awesome stuff always does the trick!_

"Some can, some can't. Now leave it at that, make-up, and get on with your lives for crying out loud!" I told them with exasperation before turning around, hoping for the best and that they'd listen.

They looked at me, and then back at each other. They smiled, apologized to each other, and then leaned close to each other; I closed my eyes and tried to think of anything and everything but what they were about to and doing right now. I didn't want to have to watch them kiss again.

I glanced over at Rex again: He was holding his head in his hand, probably trying to get his headache to go away. I felt a bit bad for him, knowing that mine had already left—yelling at Max and/or Zoe just seemed to do the trick for me every time.

I reached over and gently rested my hand on his shoulder, using a light, comforting pressure like a masseuse would to one of her patients. But I didn't know how to massage people other than the fact that more times than not the patient wasn't exactly clothed.

I asked him, a smile crossing my lips at my poor excuse for a light-hearted joke, "Are you going to survive, or should I go figure out how a defibrillator works?" Really, I had no idea what do to other than rub the pads together and shout 'Clear!' when it was nice and zappy.

He looked back over at me and snickered a little before dropping his hand back down to his lap. "No, I think I'll be fine. But how did you get them to stop arguing?" He asked as he pointed back to Max and Zoe, who were now quiet, and done with their make-out session. "I've known them for a couple of years now and haven't figured out a solution to it."

I shrugged my shoulders as I summarized it all up into a few very scientifically accurate sentences that had nothing to do with science, physics, or a brain whatsoever. "I listened to the problem, got the answer, _told_ them the answer, and boom. Happy couple."

He laughed at the 'happy couple' part—or, at least I could only figure that was the part. If that wasn't it, he was laughing about something he'd thought and/or pictured in his own mind. "You know," He said to me, a sweet smile crossing his face. "You haven't ceased to amaze me once."

I blushed with a bit of shyness before giving Rex a playful but light punch in the shoulder, and replying with a bit of a disbelieving scoff, though I did wonder if he really meant it, "You're not too shabby yourself."

The jet landed in Egypt a few hours or so later, it could've been a day knowing how long I'd slept through it. But for all I know, it could've been five minutes. Like I'd been keeping track; Max mighta been though, I was actually kinda tempted to ask. That and what he'd kept himself occupied with while I'd been sleeping.

We jumped out of the jet, our baby dinosaurs right next to us. Rex and I were the only ones who caught ours; Chomp landed on Max's head, knocking him to the ground, and the same thing happened with Zoe and Paris. Not only that, but they dinosaurs landed on their partners in a simultaneous motion too; I laughed at them both, noticed they were none too happy about it, and kept on laughing nevertheless.

They jumped up from the ground as Rex and I headed over to one of the ancient buildings, our baby dinosaurs back in their cards. The old, old rock seemed ready to collapse, but then again, then ancient civilizations had made their buildings very precise, enough so that not even a piece of paper could fit between the cracks if there even were any to speak of. So, I sorta kinda halfway doubted that it would fall down and crush us. How comforting is that?

"Okay, where's the doorknob? And the doorbell? And the keyhole? Or a window or some kind of crack me and a mouse and a piece or two of cheese can fit through?" Max asked no real person in particular as he began poking all of the little holes in the rock door he could find. For all any of us knew, he might have an imaginary little person clinging to his back whispering replies and answers to anything and everything in his ear. That would explain a lot.

After a fair amount of time spent searching for a way to get inside, and everyone else having given up, Max jumped up from his spot in the sand and exclaimed in an extremely excited voice, "I have an idea! Let's try magic words! I'll go first! Open sesame!" I stood there knowing it wasn't going to work; a few seconds later, the door opened as if on queue. _So much for frickin' logic._

"That didn't just happen," Rex mumbled to himself in disbelief, his mouth hanging open wide. Despite the fact that it would suck for him, I was thinking about how to react when a bug got caught in there. "Tell me that didn't just work."

"That didn't just work," I told him with a smirk; he hadn't said it had to be true, or that that request had been rhetorical. "Now come on, let's go." I was the first to start forward into the building, probably being one of the only ones trusting—or trying to anyway—that the door wouldn't close right after Aza and I walked inside.

We walked down a long, dark corridor for a while in silence, but it wasn't like the silence was really planning on sticking around forever, or that it was the awkward kind either. It knew that it had to leave sometime, and knowing that, it would leave the first chance it was given. Everything just depended on how that would happen.

Just like how I knew I would have to leave Rex after some time. I stopped in my tracks at the thought, making everyone else run into me. _I have to stop doing that. I have to stop thinking about leaving. I already know I didn't want to, but I don't have a choice anymore, nor did I ever have one._

Rex was, and would always be the only person on this planet that could keep me sane—for whatever reason, doing so was difficult to accomplish on my own. He was the only one that seemed to be capable of saving me from the dark, lonely abyss of myself.

"Why did you stop?" Max asked me, obviously not pleased. _Perfect, someone else I've disappointed. Now he was just like Seth. Why can't I just get something right for one measly little minute so I can learn how not to do stuff like this?! Thinking about it isn't gonna help without actions, but what else am I supposed to do? _

Tears filled my eyes, but they weren't tears of sadness, they were of my frustration with myself, with the world, and Seth's expectancy of perfection that I just wasn't good enough to live up to. I was glad that the in the darkness they couldn't see me trying not to cry. I quickly wiped my eyes on the back of my hand; I had to be stronger than this. I guess it just wasn't going to show now.

"Sorry. I just…got caught up." I answered, trying to keep my voice from becoming crackled; my tears would then to them become obvious. I didn't want that. I couldn't have that; doing so would make everything that much harder to achieve for Seth and his stupid expectations.

"Are you alright Rante?" I heard Zoe ask me; there was an obvious hint of concern for my reasoning of halting, but I didn't want to go anywhere near it now, or ever. If I went there, that would mean we were actually friends, and that's not what was supposed to be happening here. It would be helpful if they felt that way about me too.

I tried to clear my throat before I answered her, if it grew weak, she would understand I was lying, and there had to be no chance whatsoever of that option, "I'm fine. Let's go." I kept walking, alone for a few seconds, I didn't mind. And they didn't ask me about it again. I had a feeling they wouldn't, and slightly hoped that it was true. For some reason, part of me just wished they would be persistent and try to help me get this off of my shoulders, but no, they wouldn't, and I doubted that I would even let them do so in the first place.

We walked yet again in silence; I tried to keep my mind from wandering off again, but the fact that it would without much effort in doing so was completely and utterly inevitable. I tried to keep it focused on walking in a straight line nevertheless. I knew taking Rex's hand in mine might make me feel better…but then again it might just make everything worse.

I was betting on worse.

My thoughts were yet again interrupted by almost tripping on a rock. And I thought I was supposed to be paying attention to where I was going. I growled to myself. Today was not going well so far. It was all downhill from here, even though it really hadn't started out as uphill in the first place or ever.

"Why do you seem so angry?" Zoe asked me, her voice quick, wispy, and whiny. At first I thought I heard compassion in her tone, but I figured it couldn't be. She was, and had always been close to hating me. Like Seth. And you just couldn't change that about people no matter how hard you tried, or with whatever you did try.

"It's nothing," I answered her through gritted teeth; anything more and I wouldn't be able to hold back from shrieking until my throat was numb. "You wouldn't care. Just keep going, and just be quiet and leave me alone alright?!" _…But I don't want to stay here, in this silence. Trapped in the darkness and hatred of this caged mind._

I looked over at Rex, or at least where I thought he was. I could see his blue eyes glowing in the exceptionally dim light. I could almost see his face clear as daylight; I saw so many emotions in his eyes at one time. I wanted to know why they were all there, but I was no mind reader, and now just wasn't the time to be asking such heartfelt things. With Rex, I'd never get the chance to embrace a time like that.

Why he felt so many things for me, I'd never understand. Couldn't he tell that I couldn't be interested? That I didn't seem to have the choice in this one? Why the heck couldn't I piece this all together? What the heck was wrong with me? Why couldn't I just be happy? Why couldn't I just figure out how Rex really felt about me? Was he just my friend, or did he l—

I rammed into a wall; I nearly shouted something I would've regretted. The only thing I could do to keep slightly silent was bite down hard on my tongue. I thought I was going to bite it off for a second or so there though.

When I got over the fact that I'd been so deep in thought that I'd run into a wall, I looked around me. Zoe was laughing at me for running into the wall, but she must've just thought I was blinded by the darkness enveloping us, not that I'd just been thinking again. I had to use all the power of my being to make sure I didn't go and strangle her right then and there.

I clenched my fists; I tried not to punch her. I heard the light click of Rex's shoes as he walked up to me; I felt his gentle hand calmly touch my tense shoulder, pulling me slightly close to him. My fists unclenched, and hung down at my sides in an almost serene state. Rex knew I wasn't completely angry at Zoe for laughing; he could tell something completely different was bothering me inside. He just wasn't sure what, and he could see that I wasn't planning on talking any time soon, possibly ever.

I wanted to lean against him, to fall into his arms; to rest my head on his shoulder, have him hold me close to him. No, I knew I couldn't do that. I just couldn't. It would be wrong; I couldn't just throw away the mission because of some stupid feelings inside me. Seth would've told me they didn't matter, that they were worthless. And they had to be, they just had to.

….But I still didn't know if I really did think the same about them.

"Look, there's another room!" Max said as he kicked his feet into high-gear and sprinted gleefully to the next room, seeming to completely forget about what had just gone on with the wall and all of my exasperated replies. But, I guess it was better than having him linger on them for half or more of forever.

I could see light, and a fair amount of shiny objects. Curiosity got the best of me. I walked away from Rex and started heading for the room Max had just ran into. Zoe ran past me to follow Max, pushing me easily up against the wall; I didn't know why I'd become so weak and heavy laden with troubles all of a sudden. She'd either pushed me into the wall, or I fell into it.

I hoped Seth was happy. He was killing me, inside and outside. This stupid mission, the pressure of it all resting on my shoulders, it was all killing me, making me weak. I stumbled forward onto my knees; I was glad Rex had already walked past me. I didn't want him to see me like this. In fact, I didn't want any of them to see me like this at all, or anywhere near it at that.

I got back up onto my feet. It was like I'd put bullet-proof glass in front of my heart, just trying to keep my thoughts from penetrating it again. I had to be stronger than this; I had to be smarter than the D-Team for now. I just had to finish this mission. Then I could forget about all of this, and then I was home free, but with no home that I wanted to go back to. I just had to survive for a few more days before I would force myself to leave everything and try to make something new out of my life.

When I'd finally gotten to the next cavern-room, I saw giant mounds of gold and silver coins, and many other treasure-like things. Zoe was running around looking and touching everything like I'd kinda expected, while Max and Rex just kinda stood there watching her run around, trying to convince her that we needed to keep going to we could find the dinosaur.

But, that wasn't really needed. It was apparently coming to us.

The dinosaur that had sent the DinoHolders berserk began walking into the room like it owned the frickin' place. Even though with its size, I was pretty sure it could've convinced any landlord. I was about to have Aza go and take it down, but then I saw a figure appear from behind one of its legs; the person seemed unafraid, and fully aware of what he was near, so I didn't send Aza over. I put the card back in my pocket, but had to admit that I was a bit disappointed that I didn't get to fight with her at my side. Hopefully I'd get the chance to someday. Maybe.

Rex didn't realize that the person wouldn't have been standing by the dinosaur if they didn't know what they were doing, because he ran over to the woman—I had assumed that the person was feminine anyway—calling, "Miss! Watch out before it crushes you!"

When he got over to her, he took her by the arm, and tried to pull her away from the dinosaur. But she didn't move, and while not doing so she told him, "No, it's alright. Genie's not going to hurt anyone."

"Genie?" I could tell he was confused by the way his voice rose up in pitch ever so slightly when he spoke the name. Most people wouldn't name their dinosaur 'Genie'. But I think I knew who would. And I dreaded the fact that I knew for certain I was 100 percent sure I was right.

"Sara?" I questioned as I walked up to all of them, placing my hands in my back pockets to hide that they were shaking. If this other human was Sara, she might let loose that I was part of the Alpha Gang. "Please tell me that isn't you?"

She gasped. _Darn it! Most people don't do that if they don't know a person. Let's hope she's part of the most people category._ "Amarante? Oh! It is you!" Oh, perfect. It was her. Why couldn't the dinosaur have crushed her when it had the chance? It would've made everything and everyone on earth and elsewhere a heck of a lot happier.

"Oh, never mind. I guess it is you." I mumbled in annoyance that I'd hoped I wouldn't have even needed to feel right about now. I'd met her when Seth had sent me to Egypt to train or something—I still had no idea why he sent me to this place the first time, but he had, and there really was no changing that. He just kinda stuck me here for like, 3 to 5 months or something. I didn't really remember much of anything about it anymore.

"I thought I'd never see you again after you left the first time!" Sara exclaimed with a bright smile. She ran over to me and looked me up and down. For a minute I thought she was going to try and hug me, and I made sure I was ready to jump back and give an excuse having to do with small pox so she wouldn't.

"You got a bit taller. I think; I'm not quite sure. But I know you're hair got a bit longer…" Sara hadn't changed at all, still always talking and asking questions and saying things she didn't need to, and had no real good reason to be asking anyways. Then she finally noticed everyone else. "Oh, and who are they? Why haven't you told me their names yet Amarante?" _'Cause you haven't given me a real chance to, now have ya?_

But everyone just seemed to introduce themselves, and I didn't mind that. Whatever got us out of here, back on the jet, and back to the Taylor's place the fastest and with the least talking and meeting of people that I hadn't seen in years.

"I'm Zoe."

"You can call me Max."

"And my name's Rex."

"And you already know me," I stated unpurposefully; now I was starting to sound like Sara. That, was not a good thing by any means at all. If you paid me or not, I would not want to go through a day as Sara, or acting like her. Or Zoe for that matter. I'd rather choke on a pine tree. "Guys, this is Sara."

"Nice to meet you all," She said to us with a smile; even though I'd never really liked Sara herself, her smile had always been something I wondered about. How did a person this annoying and prissy—not as bad as Zoe I might add—get such a nice, warm, sweet smile? "Friends of Amarante are friends of mine."

Everyone except for me was smiling; I just couldn't help it, I didn't feel like smiling anymore today. Rex's eyes drifted over to me; his smile slowly faded when he saw my nonchalant expression. I caught his gaze, and glanced over at him. The look on his face appeared to be asking me what was up and why I wasn't enjoying the little reunion with Sara. _Like I would've enjoyed it without all this crap on my mind anyways._

I shrugged my shoulders at him, as if I were just saying I was just a bit tired or something, just not in the 'happy to see an old friend' mood. In reality, I was, and that which I said was no lie, but then again…it was. Or, at least it wasn't the whole truth that he wanted to know. But nevertheless, he nodded his head. I guess he fell for my excuse. Why couldn't he tell I was lying? Or could he, but he just never said anything about it?

"Why did you come here anyway?" Sara asked us, still smiling. I couldn't help but wonder if she kept that up, if she would get stuck that way forever. It really wouldn't be that much of change to anyone, 'cause she already did that all the time, but it would still be a bit strange. Someone's ticked at you, and they're smiling all nice and sweet and everything. It's just plain wrong.

"Our DinoHolders told us that there was a dinosaur somewhere around here. I guess it was only Genie." Max said pointing over at Genie. _Yeah, it was only a big giant dinosaur that can't possibly fit in a lamp that came out of said lamp in order to be able to crush you. In short, yeah, sure, it was only Genie._

"Oh, I'm sorry," Sara said, directing her apology to all of us even though she really had not reason to say anything close to it in the first place. Her face was now completely an innocent expression that did seem to match her words. But then again, everyone's faces did that every now and then. Unless they'd gotten stuck. "I didn't know she would interrupt whatever you were doing."

But then again, I started to take back the fact that Sara hadn't needed to apologize for interrupting anything and everything that we may've or may not have been doing when our DinoHolders exploded with berserk-ness I was pissed when I figured out that it was pretty much all Sara's fault for interrupting Rex and my—

I stopped thinking. I couldn't believe I was angry about her stopping what had gone on between Rex and me. I shouldn't be angry at her for what happened, at the very least I should've been relieved that she'd stopped me from doing something that couldn't endangered the success of my mission.

Besides, I shouldn't even feel this way about him anyway. How could I be angry at someone who didn't even know what was going on with Rex and me, or Seth and the mission? If I was going to be mad at someone, it may as well be me. There was no one left that was fit to take the blame for anything anymore.

"It's alright, I guess." I told her with a solemn tone that didn't want to mean it, but had to. That, and the fact that my bad mood trying it's best to get the heck out, and through my mouth was one of the only options. So, out came the ticked-seeming voice.

She smiled, apparently accepting my 'forgiveness', however uncertain-sounding and halfway unfelt it was. I don't think that she really had a choice not to, or could really tell that I wasn't feeling it anyways. If she could, big deal, if not, who cares? I know for sure that I don't; honestly I couldn't care less.

"We should probably go now; it was nice meeting you though!" Zoe called as she started dragging Max towards the nearest exit. I didn't understand why she felt the need to drag him, but I had to admit, it was pretty entertaining to pull him around places he didn't want to go. Except when he was covered in drool like he was right now.

"Yeah, Zoe's right—" _For once._ "—we should be heading off. I guess I'll be seeing you then Sara." I said to her as I waved unexcitedly as a gesture of said hopefully-soon-to-be-gone-good-bye, and turned to walk away. Rex was right next to me, though, I doubted that a circumstance would come that I would forget him here like we did Max and Zoe.

"It was nice seeing you again too. Oh, and, before you go," Sara stated as she placed a hand on my shoulder, sadly putting a halt on my should've-been-speedier-retreat for the door. "I have a question." _Darn you and your questions, and that dinosaur that interrupts stuff that's good to be interrupted but somehow still ticks me off._

"And what might that be?" I questioned curiously, maybe a bit too curiously for my own good. If I'd just left her with her question and said, 'Tough beans' and just gotten the heck out of there, I probably would've been able to steer clear of a lot of things I need not have talked about, or gone over.

She smiled with glee as she practically screamed at the very, very tops of her lungs, nearly making me deaf in less than three and a half seconds flat, "Do you like Rex?!" …Speaking of things I just did not want to think and/or talk about.

I nearly fell backwards, like the sound waves along were enough to knock me over now. I blushed like a moron, and looked behind me over at Rex, wanting to know what his reaction to her question was, or what it could possibly be. His face didn't seem to change, except for the few facts that he was blushing a very light pink, and he wasn't looking at me, his eyes were almost half open, and he was staring away from me at the wall. Almost like a little daydreaming face; it was kinda cute—_Stop doing that darn it! Keep your head and eyes on the mission and the DinoHolders already!_

I looked back over at Sara, and told her, still blushing, "I…I really don't want to answer that question…right now…well, I guess I'll see you around." I shouldn't have let myself stutter, but I had, and there was no way I was going to try to re-say any of that, or say anything more to her.

I grabbed Rex's arm and pulled him in the direction of where Max and Zoe were headed. Anywhere was better than here right now, and anytime at all anywhere else was better than here. I would rather be in the bottom of a deep dark abyss right now than here; at least I got to twiddle my thumbs as I fell.

I turned back to look at Sara's reaction to my reply—big mistake on my part by the way. She was smiling at Rex and me—can only imagine why. I could tell what she was thinking. But I didn't want to believe it. I never did like this chick; always assuming what I didn't want any frickin' person assuming or knowing.

She didn't think I liked him anymore, but then again, she never really had assumed that I did. I could tell that she'd figured right off the frickin' bat that it was more than that. Way. More. Than that. Hopefully she just didn't remember to add anything about me being in the Alpha Gang on our trip out.


	5. Chapter 5

**Wow, this took a long time to get out, and it's kinda short too, but, oh well I guess. At least I've got something posted after like...four weeks or something. I know it might not have been that long, but it sure felt like it. Now I've got more time to work on my two other things! Yes! Enjoy reading! (:**

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Chapter 5

I yawned loudly, my mouth stretching beyond that of what it probably should've been able to. I'd always wondered about that; I hoped that it wouldn't eventually get stuck like that anytime soon. I remembered having slept through half of the ride back to the Taylor's home, and I'd been only half-awake on the way back. I'd pretty much collapsed on the couch after walking through the front door.

I got up from the couch with a tired groan and a snap from my elbow that felt like my arm had nearly snapped off from the elbow down. I hoped it hadn't; I wrote with that hand, and that was the one I always used to hold chicken legs with when I finally got to eat it. I stood and made my way over to the kitchen; no one else was up surprisingly, but I didn't exactly mind. I wasn't a morning-talking person anyways.

I opened up a cupboard, grabbed a glass from it, and closed it slowly and quietly, knowing that even the simple _bang_ of the door closing might be enough to wake somebody up in the house. I turned on the faucet, and let the cool water fill the glass to the brim; I had no idea why this was putting me into a trance as much as it was, but I didn't know what else to do but go with it.

I was just about to raise it to my lips and actually drink some of the stuff when my phone starting ringing off the hook. I jumped with my surprise; I had no idea that someone would be calling me so early. Anyone who actually knew me at all would know that I usually wasn't up this early, not even close.

I dropped the glass of water I'd had in my hand, and grimaced with a knowing cuss in my head that that had to have woken somebody up. The cup itself hadn't shattered, and that was a good thing, but it had made quite a loud bang, and the spray of the water on the floor was—in the peaceful quiet—like a fire hose getting plugged up, then exploding.

I grabbed the phone out of my pocket with a rush that reminded me I was still trying to wake up, and so, I yawned into it before answering, "Yeah? Who is it? Whatdya want? Whatever you're selling, you know that I don't want it." I hadn't looked at the number; I really had no idea who I was talking to, if my phone had rung at all and if I was talking to anyone anyways. Well, if that was true, this was definetly a first.

I had no idea that I should've been expecting _his_ call. I heard a slightly agitated person clear their throat before the harsh voice came through loud, hard, and cold to my disrespectful 'greetings'. "Do you have the cards? I'm not giving you all the time in the world by any means."

I knew that bitter emotionless voice anywhere, if I was deaf I'd be able to recognize it; I would be able to tell by the chill that would go down my spine when he spoke. It had to be Seth; no other thing in any world that ever had or ever would exist could be anything like him. They could try all they wanted to, Seth was the worst one-of-a-kind there would ever be. But at least that meant there would never be another soul like him. "Sorry, I-I didn't know—"

"Do you have the cards, or not?" Seth interrupted, his words coming with a brutal force that showed his displeasure with my current He didn't care about what I'd said before, which was actually a bit better than him chewing me out about it honestly. And I really didn't expect him to care about my apology either. He wasn't the type to care about another's attempt at solving a problem, or anything like it at all.

I gulped nervously; usually Seth wasn't acting this aggressively anxious about getting a mission over with and done. I'd never heard him in this tone before. Was there something I didn't realize about this mission that he obviously had known for a long time? Or was he just starting to get on one of his last nerves with me taking so long to get on with it already? "No, I-I don't have them yet, but I will. I promise I will."

He sighed, a sound that told me that no such thing was going to be anywhere near good enough for him anytime soon. "Promises aren't enough, and I won't believe you plan to get them till you actually do. You have two days; that's all. My faith in you is starting to run on empty faster than you've been working. Just. Get. The. Cards. Two days. That's all you get. If you don't get those cards, you can forget about ever seeing another chance." He hung up the phone without any kind of warning. It was like the sound of a guillotine falling down upon its victim to me.

I took the phone away from my ear, and let it drop to the floor like a lead weight. The sound that it made when it hit the water-covered floor sounded just like one too. I didn't breathe; I didn't think I could. How did this happen? How could this happen? I felt sick to my stomach; I nearly ran to the bathroom, but even if I'd thought of that, I wouldn't have had the time to get there anyway.

I put my hands on each side of the sink and stared down the drain, I knew I wasn't going to be able to make it to the bathroom if my stomach decided it was more freaked out than my willpower. But nothing moved inside me other than my rapid heartbeat, and my fearful stomach calmed itself momentarily. It was all in my head. I wasn't going to be sick—hopefully anyway—nothing like that was going on—again, hopefully. All I knew was that I should probably go clean up the water on the floor in the kitchen before someone slipped. By someone, knowing everyone else in the house, I meant me.

I turned around from the sink only to see Zoe there, staring at the water on the floor. I didn't have to be a mind reader to know that she was a bit ticked that it was there in the first place. And by the wet prints on her clothing, I could tell that she'd slipped on it. Despite the fact I hadn't heard anything…huh, weird.

I grabbed a dish towel from one of the handles of the kitchen drawers and quickly cleaned up the water as I asked Zoe with a yawn, trying to make it seem as if nothing had happened that would bother me at all—if she noticed something different about the way I was acting, there was a chance she might ask about it—, "What are you doing here? What time is it anyway?"

"I have no idea what time it is, I don't have a watch and my sunglasses can't tell the time, but I'm here waiting for you to get ready so we can go shopping. I want us to get to the mall before the rush; it's murder trying to get through the crowds, trust me. Now, go wake up Rex while I wake up Max." Zoe walked over to the fridge and pulled out a package of bacon as she gestured for me to leave the wet rag on the floor and immediately do what she told me to. I couldn't help but wonder about the bacon though.

"What do you mean?" I asked with an annoyed tone and an aggravated expression that she obviously didn't take a liking to at all as soon as it was on my face. "You told me you were only taking me, and that was a long time ago too, I thought you'd changed your mind about it. Not that I have a problem with them going with if you're really being serious about us going to…_there_."

"I know, I know," She replied to me with a wave of her hand, gesturing for me to just drop it and do what she wanted me to: Go wake Rex up, however difficult it may or may not be. "I was planning on it being just a girls' day out, but then I decided to bring the guys with us, so, you know, we can have Max carry everything around. And Rex really doesn't have anything better to do. Well, besides play his violin—"

"Rex plays the violin?" I asked with a small hint of confusion—although I was surprised I'd actually heard her say that at all, since I was barely listening to her at all. I'd been in Rex's room before, that first day when I helped him put the pieces of the ten or so pages that the baby dinosaurs had chewed up back in the book. I hadn't seen anything that resembled that of a violin anywhere there at all. I mighta just been too focused on Rex…but still.

Zoe looked at me like I was a blind idiot; it was strange because usually I looked at her with that expression. Oh well, there was always three and a half seconds from now to mix it up and switch it around again. "Yeah, he does. You didn't notice it in his room? It's pretty hard to miss."

"No, I've barely been in his room." I answered blankly, keeping the fact that I had been in his room a few times, mainly that period of the book/pages incident, but I'd been practically everywhere in his room during that, so it felt impossible that I could've missed something as wonderful as a violin. But apparently so; guess I was a blind idiot.

"Well, take a look around when you go wake him up," Zoe told me, obviously thinking that I would do exactly what she asked because everyone listened to her. Though I was really trying hard not to; it was hard to now because she was talking about Rex. "You should see it." Just as the bacon she'd recently placed in the pan began to sizzle and its fumes began to fill up the entire household, Max ran into the room, mouth agape and tongue flopping around like a panting dog. But with more drool.

"I smell bacon!" Max practically shouted as he ran over to the stove, hovering over it like the alien spaceship that always followed Max around wherever he went, just waiting for the perfect time to suck him up with their little alien light-y ray thing, and stared longingly at the bacon. Honestly, if I were that bacon, I would be pretty intimidated at the current moment. I mean, anyone would be if some weird kid was staring at you drooling like crazy. I knew I had been the last time that kid that was now on Pluto had stared at me like that when I'd had a piece of licorice in the middle of class. Then the teacher took it, and we were both very depressed and ticked off for the rest of the day.

"Rante, go, wake up Rex, now! C'mon, hurry up already!" Zoe told me with a very apparent frustration as she started whacking Max with a spoon, trying to get him away from the stove so she could actually cook. Even though bacon really consisted of no cooking besides these instructions: Buy packet (or steal, your choice there), open packet (or put whole packet, plastic and all, onto the pan, another one of your little options there too), put bacon on pan (or directly into mouth, it's all gonna be going in there eventually anyways), flip bacon occasionally (or chew if last second option was followed), and _whammo_, you've got yourself either _e. coli_, or a perfect batch of bacon!

I wanted to sigh to show her how annoyed she was making me become, just so there would be two things bugging her while she 'cooked', but the sigh wasn't just because of how she was treating me as if I was the only person in the house that listened to her, when it was pretty much the exact opposite. It was just the whole thing about me only having 48 hours left to think of a plan on how to get the cards. I hadn't had much time to think really, and honestly…I didn't even know if I really even wanted to go back home to Seth with the cards and DinoHolders...

But, I guess this really wasn't the time to think about it and actually make up a plan. Right now, the main thing I had to be focused on was waking up Rex, and since this would be a first, I had no idea if he was going to grab a bat that had just happened to be sitting right next to the side of his bed and wallop me over the head with it when I attempted to wake him. I shuddered and rubbed my aching-with-too-much-thought head.

I walked through the halls, and meandered almost aimlessly into his room. I looked around for the violin Zoe had told me Rex played and noticed it almost immediately. A stupid smile crossed my face as I wondered how I'd been so blind as not to have noticed such a beautiful work of musical wood the first time I'd been in here.

I turned my attention to Rex; he was lying with his back facing me, still asleep. I walked over to the side of his bed and just kinda looked down at him, sleeping peacefully. I hated having to wake him up from this serene state, but I didn't really have another choice. Zoe would have a fit I didn't want to hear if I didn't. "Rex, wake up…"

He turned slightly in his slumber, now facing me, but he didn't exactly wake up. I wasn't exactly expecting that quiet of an 'awakening' to actually work anyway, but at least I hadn't just whacked him upside the head right off the bat. So, I tried again, but just as loud as I would've originally talked to him if he were awake. "Rex? Come on Rex, wake up. Don't make me resort to Plan B."

But nope, he didn't wake up this time either; he just took in a single deep breath, letting me know that he was completely out of it. But it wasn't that hard to believe, everyone had been fairly tired and irritable yesterday, it shouldn't have been very hard to assume beforehand. But it was if you didn't think to think of it in the first place though.

I guess I had no other choice but to resort to Plan B. "Come on Rex; please don't make me have to put Plan B into action. This is your last warning." I said lightly as I gently shook his shoulder, trying to see if I could get him to wake up without having to go through with Plan B. Nobody ever really enjoyed Plan B; if I didn't have to, I wouldn't do it to Rex.

But of course he didn't wake up to actually hear either of those warnings, or the shaking of his shoulders. For a second I had a feeling I was being too quiet about this, even though I was speaking just as loud as I usually would if I'd been talking to anyone, and that was actually fairly loud when I did talk to someone. _Nah, just use Plan B. It's always fun to see the expression of said person, even if it annoys them to the point of no return_.

I simply shrugged when, yet again, there was no response when I tried to shake him awake again. It really wasn't like I hadn't had to use Plan B before; I'd already put it into effect twice to Rod, and knew it well enough to have how to do it to Laura, even though it really wasn't that complex. Just took some getting used to, since you did have to get pretty close to the other person. But, I could make an eager exception for Rex (Happy-spiffy-sklee~!...I'm glad no one can hear what I'm thinking…).

I leaned over Rex, so my mouth was by his ear, but not exactly touching it. That would be just plain creepy if he felt that and noticed me. He'd probably have some kind of a fit, not that I could blame such an action though. Ignoring my now impending thoughts of how Rex might react very badly, I took in a deep breath, and blew deafeningly in his ear.

His eyes shot open with a surprised little panic attack, and his head jerked upwards, his mouth instantly colliding with mine. Dazed, but blissfully unaware of what had technically just occurred, I took a few steps backwards, trying to realize what I couldn't entirely comprehend (a.k.a. What had just happened). I could tell right off the bat that Rex had _absolutely_ no idea of what just happened whatsoever.

"Why did you blow in my ear?" He asked me, I could tell he was a bit annoyed, but at the same time, I knew he was glad it was me. If anyone were to wake him up in the morning like that, he'd wanted it to be me. I was happy about that, and not just because it meant something to me, but because he did have that bat I'd been wondering and worrying about right by the head of his bed. Luckily for me, it had been just barely far enough away that even if he had tried to grab it, he wouldn't have been able to reach it.

"Zoe told me to come and wake you up a few minutes ago. I warned you about Plan B, but you just kept on sleeping—man, are you a deep sleeper or what? Did you take some kind of like, superly-duperly effective pill or something?—" _Superly-duperly? What the heck is wrong with me? I sound like that one dude from The Simpsons._ "—Get dressed Rex, unless you _really_ want to go to the mall in your pajamas."

"Wait a minute, what do you mean 'the mall'?" Rex questioned with a slight tone of panic as he began getting up from his bed, touching the cold floor gingerly with his bare feet. It had always seemed weird to me how the floor was always cold no matter what you did when you woke up. You could imagine it was on fire, but then you'd realize it was on fire, but just frozen fire. Or you walked into a freezer in the middle of the night.

I answered him as I walked back over to his violin, "Zoe is apparently forcing you and Max to go with us to the mall. I tried to persuade her to let you guys stay here, but it sadly—for you—didn't work out…You play the violin?" I was fully aware I'd completely gone off topic, but I hoped Rex didn't mind. I'd rather talk about him and his violin than Zoe, Max, and the dreaded mall.

He walked over to me slowly, still obviously waking himself from the sleep still all over his body. Standing next to me, gazing at me as I observed the wonderfully beautiful violin in a silent awe of how Rex might be able to make an even more dazzling sound come from it, he smiled and told me with a hint of sleep to his voice and a light pink from embarrassment of how I was acting brushing his cheeks, "Yeah, I do a bit. Would you like me to play you something for you sometime?"

I turned from the violin to face him. "Love yo—to! To, I meant 'to'…I'd like that, Rex, I would." I turned away from him, mentally killing myself for messing up such simple words. I hoped to the highest points of heaven that such a thing wouldn't happen again.

I knew Rex heard me mess up on my words, it was written all over his blushing face, though he said nothing and proceeded to reach over for his violin. He was about to pick it up and ready himself to play something at this particular moment, but halted when Zoe came running into the room, trying her best to keep the pan of bacon away from a still-salivating-to-the-point-of-an-overflow Max.

Zoe started trying to whack Max with the pan, completely forgetting the bacon inside of it. And although, honestly, it was frickin' hilarious to watch Max get walloped over and over by the banging pan—mainly because he acted like it wasn't even hitting him and leaving marks all over him in the first place—it was a bit hazardous to be swinging a pan with un-tied-down bacon in it. That was made quite apparent when a few of the pieces flew out of the pan, and soared through the air, headed right in Rex's direction.

I thought about going to catch them before they collided with his face, but I didn't think fast enough, and besides, it was like the bacon was trying to make sure it got to him without fail, without being misled to hit something or someone else. I guess he was bacon-prone.

I wanted to laugh at the 'of course this had to happen to me' look on his face after getting slapped by the inanimate flying projectile that probably tasted just like what it looked like (BACON!...Yeah, I'm still really glad no one can hear a word of what I think all the time), but I held it back. I did, however, peel one of the slices of surprisingly perfectly cooked meat off of his cheek, and take a bite out of it.

I shrugged my shoulders, content with the taste of the pork product that always seemed to come from a package even though all of the companies said theirs was the freshest, swallowed, and said to Rex while looking at the remainder of the bacon still in my hand, "You know, it's not bad."

Zoe ran out of the room with the pan in front of her like she was chasing after the stove itself instead of fleeing from a bacon-crazed Max, who was now chasing after her like a maniacal stalker gone berserk shouting at the top of his lungs, "Gimme my bacon!"

Rex pulled the other succulent slice of bacon off of his face, and took a small bite of it. It seemed a bit less strange that he'd eaten the bacon that had been on his face, at least it wasn't as weird as when I'd taken some of it from his face. That's just kinda…odd. Oh well, too late now, right? "You're right, not bad." He told me with a smile after he'd finished chewing. I couldn't help but laugh.

Rex turned to face me with an expression that seemed to question, 'What are you laughing at now? Did you see Max go by with the pan permanently smacked on his face, or did I miss something else' and asked, "What?"

"You got a bit of bacon on your cheek," I told him with a bit of a you-may-think-I'm-joking-but-dude-seriously-I-should-go-find-you-a-mirror tone to my voice as I used my arm-length sleeve to brush off his cheek, the back of my hand gingerly brushing against his tenderly heated face. "Never mind, I got it."

He smiled warmly at me—I was surprised that he was in such a nice mood after I woke him up like I did—and his face began steadily turning a very soft pink. I grinned back at him, a fuzzily, overjoyed feeling filling my soul and heart from my toes to my nose. I'd never felt something like this before…

After a little slightly awkward moment of both of us just kinda standing there, I turned and left the room with thoughts of how strange this newly felt sensation was to me, and what it even really was, or how a person could even make themselves feeling in this way.


	6. Chapter 6

Sorry it took so long to update. I've been really stuck in my Digimon Fic, and I wanted to try to get unstuck in that before I did anything else. That, and I've been obsessed with Digimon Tamers lately, so it's been distracting me from typing anything, and I've been working out all of the character stuff for that.

But enough of my blabbing; enjoy the chapter!

* * *

Chapter 6-

We started out to the mall as soon as Rex was dressed and ready to go, and when I finally taught myself how to pick a lock, and got Max the heck out of the closet. He had locked himself in there so he could eat his bacon in peace, but then he realized he didn't have the key. And Zoe didn't exactly want to let him out, so Rex had to go into a very long lecture on why she should let him out while I picked said lock. If I asked him, I don't think Rex would be able to remember one word of that.

Both Max's parents weren't there at the house at the time, and Reese was absolutely nowhere to be found (I said she went _poof!_; everybody else thought she had a date), so, we had to walk there. 'Thankfully', Zoe had memorized the directions there before we left, and Max had drawn out a map that consisted of 'Go that way, then that way, then ask someone else for directions'. Who would you have listened to?

Zoe would always run at least three blocks away from us for crying out loud, then stop and wait for us to catch up to her because we sure as heck weren't happy about going to the mall, and by walking as slowly as possible, we delayed the pain and agony we'd soon have to be enduring when we got there. During all of this, she would be yelling back at us while jumping up and down in apparent annoyance, "Pick up the pace! Do you, or do you not want to get there?"

I knew for sure that I'd wanted to say no a few of those times, but Max jabbed me in the ribs with his elbow every time I opened my mouth to object. I guessed he didn't want me to get her angry today. Yeah, like that _wasn't_ going to happen. She would say something to tick me off, or I would say something to piss her off, thus pissing me off because she'd take the argument to my doorstep. Just seemed ordinary now.

When we finally got to the mall, Rex, Max, and I nearly lost Zoe three times, but I guess that really wouldn't have been that bad. At least in my opinion. Rex probably would've attempted to convince me to help them search for her though. But that was still better than being forced to shop at random, very prissy stores. Almost like she'd read me mind, Zoe dragged us all into _the_ girliest shop she could find. I couldn't say I was surprised.

While Zoe attempted to get Rex to try on a pink polo shirt, which looked more like a watery Kool-Aid color to me than pink, I prodded Max in the shoulder, hoping to rid myself of the boredom that was settling over my brain. "Max, I'll bet you twenty dollars that Zoe'll find the pinkest, most girly thing in here in less than—"

"Take a look what I found!" I covered my ears to prevent them from exploding when Zoe suddenly shrieked, interrupting my try at a bet with Max. Apparently I'd have to suffer with said boredom, or continually poke Max in the shoulder until it had a dent in it from too much poking. "I'm gonna go try it on!"

"…Never mind." I mumbled to him, my tone barely audible above everything else going on in the store as I sunk into the nearest chair I could find. But I didn't get to unwind for very long before Zoe yanked me back up onto my feet by my ear like some kind of servant or slave, which I made clear by slamming my heel into her foot that I did not appreciate whatsoever. "What's the big idea—And let go of my ear!"

"Here," She told me, shoving a pile of clothes that looked more like something she would wear (there wasn't one piece of cloth that didn't show off a girl's legs or wasn't pink in that freakin' pile either) into my arms before pointing in the direction of the changing rooms. "Go try these on; I think you might look good in them. They'll show off your more girly side!"

"What more girly side?" I questioned her tirelessly; if it meant not being forced into short shorts or a mini-skirt, I didn't care if I stood there asking 'why' all day like a little kid. 'Anything' is what I'd do to get out of there untainted by clothes that made anyone look like some kind of girl that hops onto the back of some creepy guy's motorcycle. "I don't have a girly side besides being a girl."

"I'm not taking 'no' as an answer," Zoe told me, also not wavering in the argument; apparently prepared to wait out my patience (_I _have_ that stuff when it comes to _her_? Who knew?_) until I relented and let her force me into whatever she felt like torturing me with. "Now go try those on!" She shoved me in the direction of the changing rooms, me snarling and growling at her the whole way there, the frilly laces burning my hands like poison ivy. The only good thing about Zoe forcing me into trying something on was that she was making Max suffer and change clothes too.

I walked into one of the rooms, and locked the door behind me with a _click_. I sighed and leaned up against the now closed and fastened door as I fingered what Zoe had picked out for me to wear, putting pretty much everything with scratchy lace and ribbon she could into the pile. "This is gonna be a long day." I mumbled to myself as I tried to shrug off the annoyance and began to switch clothes.

I changed quickly into the first things I'd grudgingly yanked out of the pile, hoping to make this last as shortly as it needed to (It was painful enough as it was; why make it last the whole day?)—both things being a mini-skirt that looked more like it was meant for some kind of Zoe clone and a pink, spaghetti-strap, V-neck tank top—but hesitated to leave the changing room as I glanced at myself again in the mirror, hating what I saw every time my eyes came into contact with the uncomfortably fashionable fabrics. _There's no way in heaven, hell, or here on earth that I'm going out there alive or dead. At least not as long as I'm wearing _this_._

I heard Zoe ask me from outside the door, gently rapping on it like the woodpecker that had attacked Max only a few minutes before we'd walked into the building, "What's taking you so long? If you need a different size I can go find it for you." _She sounds oddly nice and friendly today; she'd be a pretty good clerk or something here. _

"No, that's not necessary," I replied carefully, trying not to put anything in my statements that she'd be capable of tripping me up on later. Despite how large Zoe's brain was (I should actually say, 'wasn't'), she was actually quite clever. _Okay, forget the clerk thing. She can be a psychiatrist, or at least the janitor at the building. _"But there's no way I'm coming out of here alive…At least not wearing this."

"Just get out here!" She shouted at the top of her lungs, making all of the people in the store and in the whole freakin' mall turn and look in the general direction of the changing room I was in, and the one Zoe was attempting to drag me out of like some kind of kitten that didn't want to leave the cardboard box it had grown to know as home.

I didn't want to make a scene—at least not here, anyway—so, sighed for what felt like the billionth time today, I opened the door a crack to make sure that it was only Zoe standing outside the door awaiting my departure from the small cube-ular room. Thankfully, it was only her; it didn't bother me that much to look like some kind of preppy priss in front of her. She saw one in the mirror in her room every single morning.

The mini-skirt Zoe had forced me to wear swished back and forth like some kind of school girl uniform skirt as I walked out into the hall connecting the actual shop from the dressing rooms. I didn't like the way that it hiked up my legs as I walked, or even stood still and normal, so I tried compulsively to fix said irritation by leaning up against the wall, but I didn't even get to touch the foundation before my arm was grabbed by the pink virus that was Zoe.

"I think you look great," Zoe told me with a smile—for once it actually felt like a genuine, truthful expression. I hadn't really ever expected that kind of sentiment to come from Zoe, at least not when she meant it and wasn't just being sarcastic like I'd always pictured the prissy type saying about someone they really didn't take to like a peanut to butter. "But I think you could use Max's and Rex's opinion."

My eyes grew wide and I practically glued both of my feet firmly to the ground without even needing a bottle of glue or melting the soles of my shoes. With the sudden halt, I was capable of forcing Zoe just because of the momentum my stick-to-anything-I'm-serious-they-do shoes had gained. "There is no way—_no way_—that I'm going out there in front of _them_ looking like _this_." I told her firmly, glancing down and gesturing at myself. I looked like some kind of Shakira-ish clone of Zoe for crying out loud!

"Come on! Stop being such a…" Zoe paused, not finding a word that could exactly describe me in a language she knew I could understand, but also in a way that wouldn't taint the ears of all the smaller children (a.k.a. Max) hanging near us with their parents. "…Well, whatever it is you're being right now!" She grabbed my arm again, and tried pulling me towards the door.

But there was no way I was going out into the open like this. _Never_. However…never came a lot faster than I would've appreciated—but it wasn't completely my fault. Zoe had a very strong grip…and I might've tripped. Nonetheless, Zoe was able to pull me into the open, and all the way back to where Rex and Max were waiting for her to come back and say that all the pink she'd put on me had sent me into a comma.

As soon as Zoe had gotten me far enough away from the dressing rooms that I couldn't sprint back before anyone saw me, she moved aside and held her hands out like she'd just done something so incredible she was doing her best not to draw more attention to us and shout out, 'Ta da!' at the tops of her lungs.

I lost all color in my face when I realized that both Max and Rex were staring at me, Max's mouth agape with such astonishment at my girly appearance that his unswallowed drool was leaking out of the corner of his mouth. Rex seemed a bit less astounded, and just taken aback from the sudden chance of exterior. But then again, I was pretty sure that everyone in this whole store was.

I wrapped a hand around the back of my neck nervously as I averted my eyes from the slobbering oaf that was Max—like anyone would've—to the golden-haired Rex, catching his radiant gaze for a moment before instantly breaking the connection and looking another direction. Losing all plans on what I'd been going to say almost as soon as I opened my mouth, I croaked out a single word that would apparently have to suffice, "So…?"

A barely-visible-without-a-microscope dusted his cheeks like a sunset as he gazed at me, his eyes sparkling and shining like they did whenever he smiled. A small, tender grin formed on his lips like an angel's beam as he answered my…'question', "…You look—"

Max cut him off before he even had the chance to get past word number 2 by suddenly exclaiming in a voice that only amplified his words ten-fold, "What the heck happened to you! Did some of Zoe's toxic, girly fumes finally get into your system, or did she force you to wear those?" He was gesturing madly throughout all of his inquiries as if he were trying to kill a bug but it was getting the better of him, waving his arm and pointing from me, to Zoe, to Rex for whatever reason, and then back to me.

"The second one," I mumbled dryly, irritated beyond return at him for making even more people turn and stare at our little group out of the corner of their eyes, trying to make themselves invisible, like they weren't watching to see what would happen next. I could only assume that one of them was hoping that something would happen that he would get to go see what it was like to call security. It really wasn't as great as all the movies made it seem, since they used all of the 'interesting' characters in those scenes.

I had no idea why I even thought for a moment that I'd be able to get off the hook that easily. "Wait, Rante!" Zoe called out to me as she ran over with another heap of clothes in her arms. She forced them into my arms as she stated the obvious, "I have more stuff for you to try on!"

"You're kidding me..." I muttered angrily, scowling at the back of her head as she tried to grab my arm and manually lock me in one of the dressing rooms. I knew I was easily stronger and faster than her, but she knew that I wasn't one to run away, and that meant that there was no way I could get away with my dignity. Which was really starting to tick me off.

She shook her head stubbornly, not taking my objection as an answer, and pointed over at the changing rooms, making it completely clear what she expected of me. And that was either going to be me with a faked enjoyment, or me with an I-want-to-kill-you-so-bad-but-Max-and-Rex-won't-let-me attitude. I kinda liked the second one, it had a nice ring to it.

I mumbled something close to inaudible, but only loud enough for her to hear quite clearly, and those words weren't exactly something to be proud of, despite the expression on my face as I continued to walk past her and into the small hallway that the changing rooms were always located in. The pink-haired shopaholic glowered at the back of my head as I walked away; I could feel her eyes burning into my back as she shouted, "I heard that!"

"You were supposed to!" I yelled back, even though making a scene in the middle of a store every 3 and a half minutes and get absolutely everyone in the surrounding area to stare with such confusion it makes your brain hurt just thinking about it wasn't on my list of Top Ten Things I Want to Do in a Mall. But with Zoe it was just plain difficult to control what I did, or what I said—that was already pretty evident. She was lucky that I was in a partially good mood, and that Rex and Max were here. Otherwise, I probably would've mauled her and fed her remains to the wolves by now.

I walked back into the changing rooms, slamming the door to let out some of my pent up aggravation before locking it with a click that echoed throughout the whole hallway, and switching into the new clothes Zoe'd given me to try on—which, in her world, meant to mock my existence with. Staring at myself in the mirror with an look of disgust, I tried to perk myself up, even though I was one of the worst people you could ask to do that kind of thing. _Well, it's better than the first thing she gave me. But that doesn't mean I like it._

I opened the door a crack, scouted the area for any potential viewers, and after figuring that somebody was going to see me one way or another, moved out into the open with a growl of humiliation. Zoe was, of course, standing near the door just out of my sight, waiting to see if she would have to resort to dragging me out of there again.

After looking me up and down to assess what else she wanted to twist my arm into wearing, she smiled with a sincerity I'd never had angled in my direction before as she chimed with the glee that she always seemed to have, even when Max or I had made her blow up like a volcano, "You look so pretty in that! Red is _so_ your color—well, other than black, of course, it's so _totally_ your color." _I really hope I don't start talking like that after too long of an exposure to Pinky here._

She shoved me over by another couple of mirrors, all of them at different angles so that you couldn't look anywhere without seeing yourself staring right back at you, and forced me to look at who was hard to believe was still me again. I sighed through my nose before questioning, interrupting her as she admired what she'd come up with, "Let me guess, you have something else for me, don't you?"

"Actually, no. I couldn't find anything else in this store that would look good on you, but we have the entire rest of the mall to look for stuff, so don't worry! I'll find _something_ you'll actually _want_ to get!" She replied to my question as if it were the absolute stupidest, easiest inquiry in the whole world to her, a grin that backed up her words held on her face by her ears. As soon as she walked off and was out of sight, I fled swiftly back into the changing room, and switched back into my regular, non-sparkly clothes.

I walked back out to the main part of the store and escorted myself back to the place where Max and Rex were resting in chairs that almost all stores provided near the changing rooms. I jumped up on the arm of Rex's chair and made myself comfortable, my back leaning partially against the wall for support. He didn't seem to mind, not that I really expected him to. It wasn't like I was forcing him to wear pink or something. But the peace that had settled over us didn't last for as long as any of us would've hoped for.

"Rex! Rex!" Zoe came sprinting out of practically nowhere with enough clothes to fully dress at least 50 people, even though she threw most of them in every direction and only handed Rex a few of the things she'd had. She forcibly put them into his grasp with a smile as wide as the Atlantic Ocean stretching across her face. I couldn't help but wonder to myself if she practiced that in the mornings before she came over to the Taylor's house, or if that was a naturally occurring thing. "I found something for you to try!"

"…There's no skirt in this pile, right?" Rex asked her suspiciously, not that I could blame him for wanting to be cautious. It was Zoe after all, and you could never be entirely sure of what she was going to do next. Despite the fact that he was way too boyish to actually wear one, I tried to imagine Rex in a skirt. But, like I'd first assumed, it didn't work. So, like any other semi-normal person would've done next, I tried to picture Max with a skirt on, and fell of the arm of the chair and onto the floor laughing so hard breathing was practically as impossible as a surfing unicorn.

"What's up with you?" Max questioned with a slight curiosity as he leaned over like a hawk and stared at me as if I were a mouse having a heart attack in the middle of an open meadow with no place to go except into the predator's beak. I automatically clutched my rib cage as I started to regain a regular breathing pattern; I'd been laughing so hard it had genuinely hurt.

When I got over the laughing fit and was able to actually look at him without snickering and choking again, I explained without even a second thought, gaining a strange look from everyone within earshot of our little 'comedy act', "Oh, nothing, just pictured you in a skirt."

"What?" The brown-haired goofball exclaimed with bewilderment, seeming completely insulted and looking as if he'd been degraded from his former self and portrayed as a shrimpy nutcase in the eyes of everyone that was actually paying any attention. But that mood didn't last very long. "...So, how did I look?" He asked, his voice dripping with curiosity, almost knocking me over he was leaning over so close. I assumed it was just him trying to listen intently; I'd had to see him at school like this.

I smirked at him with a devious little snicker before humoring his inquiry and replying saucily, "You looked like an idiot, dude. Which, actually, isn't that hard to believe when you think about it." My words earned an instant scowl from the bacon-obsessed boy, who them proceeded to turn away from me with a clearly insulted little 'Hmph!'

Suddenly Zoe came out of nowhere, running over to the changing room Rex was in before tossing a few more articles of clothing over the top of the door, receiving an irritated darn-it-I-can't-escape groan in reply. Getting up from my chair, and knowing Rex was going to be in there for a while at the rate that Zoe was throwing stuff over the door—even though I was surprised that the clerks were letting her in the Men's Section at all—I cast a side-glace over to Max as I headed for the doorway, "I'm going to get something to drink, you want anything?"

"Do you think you can find me some bacon?" Max inquired with a sudden hope and excitement in his voice, a tone he held in his vocal cords like…well, a piece of bacon: Didn't let it go, and if he didn't swallow it, it was always right there with him. Except when he had said product in his mouth, then it got a bit difficult to tell what tone he was using. Or what he was saying for that matter.

"…Uhh, I don't know…maybe…Do you actually want _bacon_?" I asked him with a raised eyebrow, hardly believing that I as really having such a pointless yet tasty conversation with him. But I was courageous enough to admit: I agreed with him. Bacon was good. One of mankind's greatest ideas, to be honest.

"Umm…nah," He said with a thoughtful expression, and a nonchalant wave of his hand, as if he had been intently pondering my question, and had excused me from his presence like some kind of duke. "I think I'll just cook some more when we get back home. Go and get yourself a soda, I'll hold down the fort here."

"…Okay, you…do that, and I'll be right back. So don't…break anything." I told him with a sudden uncertainty at my plan of leaving a destructive, easily-hypered moron like him alone in a colorful, populated space with nothing to do except sit there staring at anything and everything in hopes of discovering something that he could use to smash something else with.

"Why do people _always_ think I'm going to break something?" Max yelled over in my direction, thrusting his arm out to the side in exasperation. But the sudden outward movement caused his hand to smack into an ugly lavender lamp, knocking it to the ground in the process. "…Oh, that's probably why."

"What do you know?" I exclaimed with a faked astonishment, slapping a hand to my mouth while making myself tear up for the heck of the drama. Which was actually quite difficult due to the fact that I could hardly stop grinning at the fact that he'd really been uncoordinated enough to send a lamp that had been sitting next to him since we got here onto the floor. "You're learning!"

Max smiled to himself before turning from me, and began to gaze with extreme interest at something else, making strange expressions and cocking his head from side to side as he watching…it. I tried to figure out what exactly he was even staring at, but after a few minutes with no success, I gave up and went to go do something I actually had a chance at completely without making a fool of myself: Retrieving a soda.

I meandered through the large hallways, winding in and out from groups of people as I attempted to remain untrampled. I could remember having seen someone selling drinks and other stuff of the like only a few stores down from the one that Zoe was now holding us prisoner in. After recalling which direction it had been in, I headed that way and found it reasonably easy, paying for what I'd been searching for as soon as the line got to my spot. When I turned around, taking a decently large sip of the newly-provided beverage as I did so, I noticed Laura and Rod standing directly in front of me.

I nearly snorted the bubbly sugar-water out through my nose at the sight of the two familiar kids. _What the heck could they be doing here? _After I'd regained my composure, I questioned them in a hushed, anxious tone, hoping that none of the little group would decide that I'd been gone for too long of a time and come looking for me. "What the heck are you guys doing here? What if they see us talking?" I'd come too far for them to blow this mission for me, and this was the last chance that Seth was giving me to prove my loyalty to the team. I couldn't let them be the cause of a possible failure.

"Don't worry so much, Rante. We're only here because Seth told us to make sure that you knew you didn't have much time left to complete the mission before we took over. And don't worry about them seeing us talking; it shouldn't be too hard to figure out some sort of cover-up for it." Rod told me with a slight shrug of his shoulders, seeming to be the complete opposite of me at the current moment: Utterly calm beyond all natural understanding.

I growled with a light, common irritation; I knew he was correct, like he was most days, though I hated to admit it. This entire conversation, this whole meeting, between the three of us could be covered up quite easily with a few short, effortlessly believable lies. I loathed how simple such creations were to form within one's self, and what a thing like them could turn you into after years and years of experience with them.

Lies. Things I'd been taught by my parents to try my best to stay away from. Well, at least I thought I remembered them telling me something about that when I was quite young, probably not even able to talk yet, but it felt like something they would've told me. I could only guess they knew what was plausible to happen, and that they just wanted to make sure I knew the joys of a truthful life before I ruined it for myself. They were just trying to be the best parents they could be, even if they didn't get to see the day I finally put their words to good use.

I tried to snap out of my depressed zone quickly, never having enjoyed the emotion that dragged many people into the darkness of the corner of the room, light reflecting from their shiny tears as they dripped down their face, arms cradled around themselves, attempting to protect themselves from the cold, but failing. Until nothing could be felt but the cold.

Trying to return to the conversation at hand with a literal shake of my head, I told them with a mental roll of my eyes, though this was not a thing to be taken lightly, "I know; he already told me that I only had two days left, or something like that. I'll get it done, alright?" I glanced over my shoulder back at the store I'd left those three at, hoping that one of them wouldn't look out the window and wonder where I was, only to go looking and find me speaking with their enemies—my allies. "I should go now. If I stay much longer they might start to wonder where I am. See ya."

I spun around hastily began to speed-walk away from them, hoping to get away and return to the others before one of them noticed how long I'd been gone in search of some kind of beverage vender, but I slowed when Laura spoke up quietly, almost nervous as she called out to me, "…We miss you back at Zeta Point." _…She…They…m-miss me? What is she talking about?_

I didn't know what to actually say, so I just glanced back at her out of the corner of my eyes and gave a slight nod of my head, letting her know without a single word that I barely understood their pain, and that they'd just have to deal with it on their own. I didn't know what else to do, I wasn't used to people missing me, or at least making it known.

When I got back to the store Zoe and everyone else was at, I found Max where he'd been when I was gone, Zoe nowhere in sight, and Rex was, to my calculations, still in that changing room. I sighed exasperatedly before taking a sip of my soda and walking hesitantly back into the store, regretting my choice when I realized that since I'd been gone, Zoe'd probably found more than 40 billion things she intended to use to torture me. Despite the knowledge of that gruesome fact, I sat down in the chair next to Max, already forming a plan of action if Zoe came back and tried to get me in another mini-skirt: Throw drink in face and run like mad.

Groaning with boredom as he rolled his head around for something to do, the brunette jumped with surprise and a splash of fright when I caught his gaze and noticed I was back from The Land That Sells Sodas and Other Carbonated Beverages. "When did you get back here?" He inquired while looking around with such franticness that you'd think I'd said something about his stalker having followed him, and was currently hiding in a coat rack waiting for him to come by it so he could shout, 'Pick me! Pick me!' at him.

I shrugged and took another sip of the fizzy drink before belching slightly and telling him nonchalantly, "I don't know, about five minutes ago or something like that," I glanced over at the uncanny boy, who was now more interested in counting the tiles on the ceiling than his original question's answer. "You didn't notice me here?"

"Nope, I was busy looking for Zoe—do you know how boring that can get when you don't have any clues, or feel like getting up from a semi-comfy chair to look for one? I don't know where she went. But anyway, for all I know, she could be having a nervous breakdown somewhere because she's surrounded by clothes and really expensive stuff. But, since I'm not really sure about that yet, I'm not going to go check. If I do, and she's not having a nervous breakdown, I'm probably going to be one of the next people in a changing room." _Wow, he's got his whole darn life figured out, and I haven't even planned past the end of this straw._

I couldn't help but agree with his logic; if she was going to have a sudden breakdown, she knew she may as well have it because she's surrounded by everything she holds dear. And besides, I sure as heck wasn't going to go looking for her even if that had happened. That's why even young-ish people needed Life Alert. _Help, I'd had a nervous breakdown due to frilly pink clothes, and I can't get up!_

I took another drink of my soda as Max started to speak about something that I assumed was going to be one of the most random, mindless things I was ever going to hear anyone or anything utter, but he suddenly stopped, for once. I would've questioned what the newfound silence was for when I caught a glimpse Rod and Laura out of the corner of my eye as they walked by the very store window that we were in. As soon as they looked back over at me, I jerked around quickly, hoping to avoid catching their gaze and making one of the trio accompanying me suspicious. However, I relaxed after I glanced back again and they were gone.

When I spun back around and was about to ask what I'd missed, I noticed Rex standing only a few feet away, wearing a bright white polo that seemed to catch the light and reflect it in all directions, causing it to look at if he were shimmering, intensifying the embarrassed blush on his cheeks and the bold cerulean-ness of his eyes. The soda that had still remained unswallowed dribbled out of my mouth, down my chin, and onto the floor with a pattering sound on the pink-polka-dotted tiles, my cheeks growing hot when I realized how dumb that must've looked to everyone, and even me since I saw the whole thing go on in a mirror a couple of meters away.

"Rante? Rante? You there? Or should I leave a message?" I heard Zoe ask as Max waved his hand in front of my face irritatingly, or at least it would've been if I hadn't been blocking it out of my view of Rex. I loved how people could do that; brains were awesome. Except when they got cancer or something, then they were just kinda depressing.

I snapped out of my Rex-induced trance with an earthquake-ish shake of my head, giving myself the worst headache in headache history after I finally stopped and found my puréed head again, "Huh? What day is it? What month are we in—actually, somebody should think of a better question. I was never good at remembering the month until the last minute. Or the day for that matter."

They all stared at me like I'd just had one too many beers or something and was dancing around the room wearing Max's dirty underwear on my head while singing the theme song for Edward Cullen that I'd come up with when I'd gotten bored back at Zetta Point. Rod had found it hilarious, but Laura and Ursula seemed kinda offended by it. Heaven and Twilight knew why. Zoe was the first to break the awkward staring contest. "Uhh, you were staring at Rex kinda weird…" But without barely even a moment's notice, she'd changed the subject from Rex and my eyes having been glued to him to something completely different and not as interesting. "Is anyone besides me hungry?"

"Uhh, I can go change now, right?" Rex asked hesitantly, hoping that his words of expectant escape wouldn't set Zoe off into another far more hazardous shopping mood that involved getting him into more frilly, pretty-boy clothes. The unique-haired boy stuck his hands in his pockets, gazing over at Zoe as he patiently awaited her answer. I could say one thing about Rex and I: He had patience, I did not. I would've mowed Zoe down by now and made a break for the door if both he and Max hadn't been there to grab my ankles and drag me back into the pink-hued torture.

But Zoe shook her head like the stubborn pink-haired twerp that she was and shook her finger at Rex before stating, her finger moving back and forth with each word she spoke, "Not until Rante gives her opinion on how you look. She's been gawking at you long enough to have thought of something by now," Ceasing the shaking-of-the-finger technique for the current moment, Zoe directed her attention to me and commanded with a stern tone, like one you'd use with a little kid that just took a cookie from the forbidden cookie jar. "Rante, give your opinion."

I blushed at Rex, my features now a bright cherry red like a Cardinal's feathers, bold and proud (That was the exception in my case) in the sunlight (Mall-light-bulb atmosphere). Just as he had when I'd first become acquainted with him, Rex still seemed to shimmer, the illusion amplified by the vividness of the white, his angelic blue eyes sparkling in the light as if we were truly in direct sunshine. My head spun around wildly (Figuratively. I hope), absorbed in the adrenaline-heat of the radiance as I stuttered, "I-I think you look…I can't keep my eyes off of you…"

I turned away from them in shame and humiliation as my face glowed with even more blood-red feathers dancing in patterns on my cheeks and dusting over my nose like freckles. I knew I blushing like a moron, but I really didn't want to be reminded of it by Thing 1 (a.k.a. Max) or Thing 2 (a.k.a. Zoe (Haha, Zoe. Max got picked over you!). That, would be a true insult. And someone would be tied in a knot, thanks to the help of the hangers.

After Rex had changed back into his regular clothes, we all walked into the food court for a lunch break. It gave us at least a half hour or so to rest before Zoe and Max (apparently he'd gotten into the shopping mood) dragged us to the next store. Then another, and another, and another.

What fun.

Rex and I picked out a table, and sat down to make sure nobody else came and stole it while Zoe and Max went to get everybody something to chew on—mainly because I didn't trust that the table would still be standing if it was the other way around. I knew I was probably right, too.

The two of us sat there silently for a while, and it lasted long enough to make me wonder what Rex was even thinking about. There had to be something intelligent-ish going on in there. He was pretty much the exact opposite of Max after all. But the silence was broken—and so was his train of thought—when I inquired, "_So_…you having fun?"

He glanced over at me with a strange expression on his face; from what I could gather, it was saying, 'Fun? This is definetly no place for such a word to be said'. I grinned and laughed slightly, agreeing with a small nod of my head before replying to his look, "Just…trying to make some sort of conversation."

"I know," Rex told me with a slightly apologetic smile, though he had no reason whatsoever to be saying he was sorry about what he'd said. Or, what I'd figured he'd said. "…Are you having fun?" I shook my head with a cheerful disbelief when he used the same word I'd just pictured him saying this wasn't the area for. _Dude, I gotta think through my facial expressions._

I continued to smile like a dork as I answered, feeling like the idiot I was over 50 billion percent sure I looked like, "No, not really," The grin was still there, stuck like a permanent marker slip there on my face. I was really starting to wish that I had a mirror so I could see just how idiotic I looked. It would be a nice start at laughing hysterically at myself. "I feel kinda bad for you though."

Rex seemed puzzled almost before I'd stopped talking; he'd either missed something, I'd missed something, or I'd been spending way too much time with both Max and Zoe and was starting to catch on to the whole say-stuff-you-barely-even-know-what-is-and-hope-that-the-other-person-is-just-as-stupid-involving-said-subject-as-you thing. "Why? I don't think anything _that_ bad has happened today." He blinked at me a few times, the shimmery-ness of his sea blue eyes sending a fiery red hue to my cheeks.

I grinned with slight agreement as I explained to him, the stupid grin still there on my face along with the hot blush of anxiousness and embarrassment, "Well, you know, you kinda got swamped by Zoe—actually, mostly the clothes she was throwing at you." We both laughed a little; Rex's laugh was cool, and completely calm, while mine was obviously that of a person that was freaking out beyond human capacitation while they tried to seem a bit like a normal person for a few minutes a day. At the rate this was going, I'd be acting like a moronic nut job for the rest of the week.

Rex let his sweet little laugh ring out clear and beautifully reverberating around the room, hitting my ears with a little tickling feeling that made my blushing all the worse. The sensation was like having a soft little feather being brushed lightly across your face, with no intention of ceasing until you were addicted to the tender touch. "You should've seen what she tried to get Max to wear while you were gone."

Getting over my fluffy little infatuation stage for a short moment, I leaned in closer to him with a curious grin and a question playing on my lips, my voice hushed for the heck of the drama as I inquired secretively, "What did she do?"

He sat forward, inching towards me (I was pleading with the clouds I couldn't see through the ceiling that he was either oblivious of my red cheeks or didn't understand what I was going through do to his…Rex-ness), a smile that told me clearly that Max hadn't wanted him to speak of it, but he would break that rule for me just this one time creeping its way across his face, "She got a little bored, so she talked him into trying on a skirt, so she could see what he looked like as a cross-dresser. Being completely honest, and quoting Zoe, give him a wig and that goofball could've passed as a lady, no problem," The little gestures and faces that Rex kept making to reinforce his statements nearly had me banging my head on the table just to keep from going into a laughing fit. "He kept telling me it was quite comfortable, and tried to get me to try one on, but I refused until he gave up."

I let out my laughter, most of it from the mental motion picture that Rex had produced in my brain, the scenes being narrated by Rex's words and sent into life by his gestures. Add some description and funky words and he could write himself a short story or something. I know I'd read it, and not just because there was a chance that it would earn me brownie points with him. "Heheh, I'm not surprised."

"About what? That Zoe got Max to wear a skirt just by talking to him for 20 minutes, or that I refused to try one no matter how many times Max clung to my leg?" The blonde-boy inquired with a slight hint of puzzlement to his tone; I couldn't help but snicker to myself, he was pretty darn cute when he was confused. And besides, now I had even more to add in that little mental movie.

"Both, but I'm talking about you this time," I blushed slightly at my words, noticing after it was way too late to change them that they actually had a bit of a flirting tone to them, despite the fact that I would've had my tongue robbed by a cat before I'd intentionally flirted with Rex. It was just that difficult. "You've always seemed too smart for a skirt." _Okay, so maybe this kind of thing comes naturally when you talk to Rex. He just pulls stuff like this out of people like taffy._

"I think that's a good thing," Rex chuckled with a glowing smile, the radiant light emitting from him nearly blinding me, though it would've looked pretty weird if I put a hand over my eyes. And I wouldn't have noticed that he was blushing ever so noticeably at the compliment that I'd given through accidental flirting. We both began to laugh, his light and airy, sweet as always, and my own clearly having a heart attack deep down inside. Or wherever the figurative heart was.

Our little conversation was ended (I was depressed at that…) when Zoe and Max came back with a few trays piled high with food. Instantly Zoe became suspiciously nosy at the reason to why we were leaning so close to one another, and voiced said feelings thusly, "What're we talking about?"

"Eh, it's nothing," I told her with a smirk in Rex's direction; he replied with a soft smile, causing my skin to heat up like the beginnings of a fire, just waiting to burst into life and bring everything into a fluorescent beauty that was unable to be matched by anything. Except maybe Rex. "Just, ya know, talking. Nothing too important."

She gave us both a weird look of curiosity, but shrugged it off and forgot about it, instead busing herself by yelling at Max to knock it off as he got ready to pelt her with a fry, taking his time to carefully aim at her so he wouldn't waste the shot and not even hit her. I could tell by the way he took about a minute to actually throw the thing, thus taking his chance with fate, that he planned to hit her in the face. He succeeded; his laughter told all of us he thought it was worth being pumbled to death.

Zoe snarled at him with her instantaneous rage, and leapt out of her chair, tackling Max out of his chair, onto the floor, where they continually attempted to overcome the other by slapping, kicking, shoving, and biting. I was pretty sure the main goal of this was to either kick the crap out of the other person, or just to pin them down. Right now, neither was actually happening.

I watched them for a little while, thinking of whether or not to stop them, but also knowing that if I even tried, I might lose a finger. Or an arm. After a few seconds of complete and utter boredom at the same moves over and over again, I shrugged my shoulders and robbed Max of one of his fries. I thought about eating like a normal human being would for a minute, but throwing it at Zoe like Max had demonstrated just seemed so much more…enjoyable.

I gave the slice of fried potato a toss and it hit her on the cheek, leaving a small smudge of untouched ketchup on her face, the sauce making a smacking sound as it collided with the skin. Despite how stupefyingly slow the situation seemed to unveil itself, so far, it was worth it. I'd never thrown a French fry at someone with pink hair before.

She jumped up from the ground as if everything below her feet was made out of scrap trampolines, and swiveled around in a complete 360 degree angle, the whole time she was practically shouting, "Who threw that?" At everyone that even looked like they were glancing in her direction. But who wouldn't when a person with hair like a prissy pine is shouting about projectile potatoes?

She glared down at Max, obviously thinking that he must've been the culprit. But the brunette simply raised his hands in submission as he lay there trapped by her foot on the white, smudged-up floor as he protested, "Hey, I was having an argument, I couldn't have."

She immediately turned and glared at Rex, jumping to the conclusion that the calm, serene boy just had to be the one who'd decided to suddenly turn on her in the 'battle' and chuck a piece of fried food at her. Was it just me, or did it seem like she had her clues a bit jumbled up?

I growled as I stood up, taking a single step towards her as I grumbled, irritated by her look of accusation at Rex, "Put one single hair out of place, and you're going to be one limb short of a normal person. And besides," I straightened my spine and jutted out my chin, challenging her to make something of my confession. "I threw it. But Max threw two, didn't he?" _A perfect two-step plan. Number One: Say the first thing they'd expect since you're the only one left. Number Two: Point the finger at Max. It's flawless._

She smiled almost devilishly, and—ignoring the last sentence—blurted loud enough for all of Japan to hear, but only the three of us right at this table to understand in the slightest, "You like Rex, don't you!"

My eyes grew wide with a slight fear of her sudden accusation as I told her, my voice suddenly weak, making it simple to pick out my nervousness, "I do not. I just don't want you screwing up his hair." But my deep red face made it clear to her that I had to be lying, even though I honestly thought it was kinda believable. If you really, really, really thought about nice looking hair. And…well, me not wanting its spiffiness corrupted.

"Oh, come on!" She crooned again, a grin that passed as the Cheshire Cat's stretching across her face, the ends of her mouth connecting with her ears and making one giant, gaping hole in her head. "You're not this protective of just anyone!—" _Then you've never seen me around a cookie before._ "—You like him! You do! You do!"

"…I don't!" I shot at her again, trying to keep my uneasiness under control, but failing miserably as my face became even more flustered. I slipped my hands rapidly into my pockets, trying to hide that they were shaking. _No way am I going to cave. I would rather die in a cave than cave now._

"Yeah, you do!" She prodded further and further into my skin, literally poking me with every word that fell out of her mouth like water from a faucet. An annoying, sun glasses-wearing, sorry-excuse-for-a-type-of-red-haired faucet that was capable of dragging two and a half brains other than hers into the mall to drain them of all liable escape of any kind in the future. Lovely.

I snarled at the strawberry-blonde, my eyes burning into her skin as she smirked at my cherry red face. I was doing my best to keep from facing Rex; I didn't want him to notice the simple fact that I was heating up like marshmallow in a microwave set for five minutes. "I don't."

"You do!" She continued her 'verbal assault' with another volley of prods, enraging me further each time her sticky-with-lavender-scented-lotion finger touched my shoulder. "You can't hide it from me!" _Wanna bet, ya funny smelling, pink fur ball?_

But I was just as headstrong, if not more, than Zoe, and could keep this up all day. I only had to keep on repeating the exact same two words: 'I don't'. "Just watch me: I. Don't." It wasn't like it was really that hard to keep from agreeing with her. It was harder to make my answers believable by Rex's ears, however.

We probably would've gone on like that for quite a while if Max hadn't interrupted; _Whatdya know? His mouth actually came in handy for once_, "…Are we going to the next store, or do we have to keep listening to this? 'Cause I'm getting really bored! And that's not fun because it's boring being bored because—" _…Who knew there were so many ways to say the exact same thing?_

"Let's go!" Zoe seemed to simply erase the current conversation from her memory as if her mind was a blackboard, our words written in chalk and the eraser now having been thrown out the window as the two of them took of running for a random store.

I turned towards Rex slowly, almost afraid to see what his reaction to all of that might be. But he just sat there and gazed into the air where the little spat had just occurred, obviously pondering what had just happened. I couldn't say I blamed him for being a bit confused though, but confused was better than knowing that I wanted to ask if he was busy any approaching night.

I interrupted his intricate thoughts by pointing out to him, gesturing in the general direction of the stores that Zoe and Max had madly run off towards, their eyes glowing like they were in the mood to smash anything and everything around them. _As long as we stay behind them, we might be fine._ "We should probably follow them. Ya know, make sure they don't break and/or steal anything."

"Sounds like a plan to me, TeTe," Rex grinned as he got up out of the chair, and began walking next to me as we followed after Zoe and Max into the next store. I was happy that this one wasn't as frilly and pink-paint-and-glitter-that-one-of-my-teacher's-had-not-hated-but-greatly-disliked-happy as all of the other dozen and three shops that Zoe had dragged us kicking and screaming into.

I followed after him slowly, blushing and feeling oddly dizzy for the newly given pet name. Despite how often they attempted to make up a little name for me, I never allowed Rod and/or Laura to successfully give one to me permanently. I didn't enjoy being called something cutesy, or all frilly and lovey dovey or something. Although, for Rex…I'd make an exception.

I hadn't forgotten the conversation, despite all else that was happening now—well, you could call it a conversation, I guess—that Zoe and I had (The 'else that was happening' was actually Max trying to convince Zoe to try on a very skimpy red dress, and her protesting that she would look like some kind of prostitute in it. Max didn't seem to understand what the big problem was, apparently.). I was anxious for the rest of the day, hoping and pleading with the heavens she wouldn't bring it up again. But thankfully, and to my surprise, she never did mention it for the remainder of the day; maybe she could tell I didn't want her to. Was this her way of attempting to make herself a…friend to me? Or something?


	7. Chapter 7

Wooohooo! Yeah, man! After forever and a couple of infinities, I have finished editting Chasing Cars! And I love seeing how different I write compared to way back when. I had a blast going through this again, and I hope all of you enjoyed reading it, and are looking forward to reading the epic finale. Well, here it is. And I couldn't be happier after not having posted practically anything for such a long time. Enjoy!

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Chapter 7-

We got back around eight, and it was a day too late. I could hardly believe that we'd been at that place for hours. I barely even wanted to be there for five minutes (But if I left, then Zoe would've followed me back and nagged the whole time. So it wasn't like I had much of a choice). My head felt like someone had repeated been stabbing it with a butcher knife for the heck of the thrill.

Everyone fell into the closest chair they could find and nearly passed out instantaneously. I was sure that this day couldn't possibly get any worse than Max's dad hogging the television remote and refusing to switch it off of Hannah Montana. Max tried arm wrestling him for it, but he lost pathetically and nearly broke the table when he kicked it out of anger and embarrassment. But my hope was murdered brutally when Zoe suddenly sprang to her feet, and yelled as she raced out of the room, "I know what we should do now!"

"Oh, my…" Max mumbled to pretty much no one (I was trying to zone out and Rex was already passed out, his nose twitching slighting as he snored lightly), perking up slightly to watch as Zoe dashed from the room at the speed of a NASCAR vehicle. There was actually a noticeable amount of fear to his voice, which made me wonder exactly what he thought she could be off retrieving to occupy our brains with now. "What is she going to force us to do now? I don't know if I even wanna know…"

Zoe sprinted back into the room with every single baby dinosaur following her; despite the fact that she'd hardly ever been around me, even Aza was with them. I found this incredibly odd since Aza really wasn't the socializing type, though I barely knew who she was at all. She seemed to recall more often than I did that we were here on a mission, not to make friends for life. But I had to play along until I actually though of a semi-decent plan, so I questioned the pink-haired nuisance, "What are you—"

"And a one, and a two, and a one, two, three, four!" Zoe chanted rhythmically, interrupting me without a second thought as she swayed her arms back and forth like some sort of music instructor or composer. I wasn't sure if I even wanted to ask for her to explain this one. I was almost completely sure that it would come back to bite my head off like a cat to a sewer rat. Then it got rabies, so at least Zoe would be rabid afterwards.

However, I understood during the next few seconds.

Paris started screeching like it was dying, Chomp started doing this little dance while doing the same basic thing that Paris was except in a deeper pitch, and Aza and Ace did a little simultaneous skit-thing to Paris and Chomp's beat. I had to admit, I'd seen worse (Twilight and the Dino-Dance over there could kick Hannah Montana's butt). But I hadn't heard worse (Still better than Miley Cyrus though. Rod was obsessed with her, and that was all that you could hear whenever he drove one of the jets).

I slumped down in my seat as they continued for the fourth time; there was no way that I was going to be able to zone out now, they were making way too much of a racket for that. I didn't want to cover my ears; I didn't think that would help, and it would only irritate me that much more if I learned that I was right and my plans were a waste of time. That wasn't a very good self-esteem builder. Besides, I was sure they would just get louder so I _could_ hear them. I envied Rex; he was still sleeping like a baby.

Max and I both let out a sigh of relief when they stopped, but Zoe seemed much more proud of the inhuman sounds that had come out of them. Even dinosaurs shouldn't have been able to make those sounds; their dancing could've used work, but it wasn't like I could do that much better. "One more time!" Zoe shouted, beginning to conduct them again before anyone even had a chance to protest. But surprisingly, they didn't continue with the odd sounds and noises this time. It _was_ clamor, but they were to the beat of an actual song, one that I knew, but hadn't heard in a very long time. I could vaguely remember the lyrics to it as they screeched the beat.

_We'll do it all, everything, on our own._ _We don't need anything or anyone. If I lay here, if I just lay here, would you lay with me and just forget the world? I don't quite know how to say how I feel. Those three words are said too much. They're not enough. _

_If I lay here, if I just lay here, would you lay with me and just forget the world? Forget what we're told, before we get too old. Show me a garden that's bursting into life._

_Let's waste time chasing cars around our heads. I need your grace to remind me to find my own. If I lay here, if I just lay here, would you lay with me and just forget the world? Forget what we're told, before we get too old. Show me a garden that's bursting into life._

_All that I am, all that I ever was, is here in your perfect eyes. They're all I can see. I don't know where, I don't know how as well, just know that these things will never change for us at all. _

_If I lay here, if I just lay here, would you lay with me and just forget the world?_

Almost as soon as they were done with their little song-thing, Max leapt about thirty feet out of his chair, screaming loud enough for all of earth—and every other planet for that matter—to hear, "What happened? What did I miss? Aw man, did I sleep through the end of the world again?"

Max's shouting had shaken Rex from his deep sleep, and he now stared at him as I snickered to myself. It wasn't very hard for me to be able to remember when I told the brunette that. He'd fallen asleep in the jet a little while before we'd gotten back the day we'd gone to Egypt, and I'd had the brilliant idea to wake him up by shouting that he'd slept through the end of the world, but now everything was okay and he'd have to wait for the next apocalypse to see what it was like.

What can I say? I got bored.

I got up from my spot next to the had-been-sleeping-peacefully Rex, and walked down the hall in search of something other than screwing with Max's mind and listening to the dinosaur-version of songs that I hadn't heard since before the beginning of time. Stuff like that…it was so full of memories that stung like lemon juice in your eye, but you couldn't just wash it out and everything would be fine and dandy again.

I paced up and down the hall aimlessly, until something in Rex's room caught my eye, which was understandable since the door was partially open and the door was slightly distorted my vision (To be honest, I could've sworn I saw someone moving around, so I got a bit paranoid). Not that I was frightened or anything; I just didn't think that Rex would appreciate being stabbed in the middle of the night while he's trying to get some rest. And truthfully, I wouldn't like that very much either.

I walked inside and wandered over to the area of the room that had caught my eye, (In the dark, it was kinda hard to tell exactly where anything was, and I'd been stupid and left the light off) completely ready to lash out and attack anything or anyone that wasn't supposed to be in there, and went over to what I saw. But it was only his violin; the way the dim moonlight reflected off it made it seem to shimmer and glow, like it was made of honey-shaded gold. _I feel like an idiot, but it is a pretty sight. _

I turned around to walk back out of the room, not wanting to just stand in there like a nutjob and stare at an instrument that I could've sworn was some kind of an intruder, and nearly ran into Rex in the process. I jumped, completely taken off-guard by the blonde that had just been asleep what seemed like only a few moments ago in the living room. I hadn't even heard him walk in, or through the hallway for that matter. "Oh! Sorry Rex, I…uhh, I just…I can…go, if you want me to..." I stuttered moronically, feeling more and more like I sounded as the seconds—and minutes—ticked by.

"Oh, I'm sorry, Rante," Rex apologized calmly, his tone and expression making it seem like people wandered into his room with the hopes of striking some kind of freaky-kidnapper-dude up-side the head every minute of a normal day. "I didn't mean to startle you. I just came to see what you were doing; it didn't exactly seem like you to move when you…well, whenever you don't have to." A small grin crossed his face, almost as if he were asking if that had been alright to put in such a way, but I gave him the 'inspection pass' that he'd been looking for when I let out a minute snicker and a smile of my own.

To be honest, I wasn't quite sure that I was even going to get back up off of that couch at all after today, but I couldn't just sit there and watch Zoe waver her arms around like a dying mongoose…so I started wandering around and then I saw something shiny in your room and I thought it was some kind of reflector-tape-wearing intruder so I came in to whack him with an imaginary bat that I didn't have but it just ended up being your violin, which I had no idea that you could play despite that fact that Zoe said you'd even practiced a few times while I've been here but I never heard it before so…yeah…" I tried to control my breathing—and blushing—after having spit out a speech rivaling the length of the Declaration of Independence (I'd read something on a revolution of some kind in America, and that term had been used multiple times and was incredibly important).

It took Rex a moment or two to completely register all that I'd spat out in less than about four seconds, not that such a response wasn't entirely understandable. If some love-stoned nimrod had come up to me and started talking about stupid home-robbers, and had been taking at highway-speed-limit pace, I would take my dear sweet time trying to decipher all that they'd just gushed out too.

But he got the point a heck of a lot faster than most people I knew—including myself—would have. "…Would you like me to play something for you?" The angel-blue-eyed boy inquired with a playful, amused tone and a similar smile on his porcelain-perfect face, the combination making me smile like I'd just been stuck with a peanut butter bomb filled all the way up to the exploding point with laughing gas.

I tried to get a grip on both myself and the situation—without physically slapping myself across the face a few times or pinching my arm, even thought it would've worked I wasn't quite sure that that would make the best impression in the world—before replying, clearing my throat to get rid of the excited squeak that was threatening to jump out of my throat, "…I'd like that..." I wasn't sure if it was right to be nervous or not, but as Rex walked back over to the door and actually turned on the lights, I realized that I wasn't going to be able to control if I was going to be controlled by such an emotion or not. It was obviously going to be the number one in my head for the current couple of moments. No questions asked, or answered.

I walked over to Rex's neatly made bed (It was like he never even slept in it since the day it was put in there), and sat down at the very foot of it, hoping to stay as far from Rex as possible even though all I truly wanted to go was go over and hug him for no particular reason other than the fact that I was dying to. It was one of those things that would kill you not to do, but would kill you all the same if you did. But in that kind of a perspective, you could die in multiple, extremely different ways. Heck, I didn't care if I died. I wanted to hug the guy!

Rex picked up his sparkling violin, and chose by his own will to sit down near me, but still a slight ways away, as if letting the choice be mine to move any closer, or farther away. Letting me show him exactly where I wanted us to be. But I was too scared out of my head in the first place to even be able to move without falling flat on my face. So I stayed put for lack of a better idea.

Rex began to play a very quiet tune, the intoxicatingly hypnotic melody rolling through the air to my eager ears like a light mist in the middle of wet morning. I could almost see myself walking through that very fog and through the streets of Japan, but I wasn't alone, according to the currently changing beat of the notes. I was with someone I held dear, that made my heart sing and pound like the high chords he played. In the music, I didn't feel so anxious, afraid; everything was serene and oh-so-very perfect.

My heart was beating like a song in fast forward, though it was hard to even listen to it jabbering on and on when Rex was playing such lovely sounds from the violin. Probably—actually, not probably, definetly!—not the one that Rex was playing; it was far, far too stunning to speed through with such, for lack of better words, disrespect as you would to any other song that you may not like as much as the next one on the disc.

I drew my feet up against my chest, the springs in the mattress creaking slightly as I did so. I snarled my arms securely around my folded-up legs, holding them close to me as my head swayed back and forth to the rhythm of the music, almost as if it were a movement that was not questioned, not chosen, but done out of pure hypnotism that the soft sounds produced.

I sighed quietly as my thoughts started to surge forth from the music like glooms in the dark of the dusk. Rex was like that violin in many ways: He was quiet, but when he did speak up his voice was heard and interpreted by all around, always making a life-changing impression on those around him. That very voice was like a gentle breeze, gliding through the air with incredible, inconceivable grace. The way his hair shined in the moonlight that was shimmering in through the window was similar to the golden wood of the instrument, but was far more radiant than the violin. However, there was absolutely nothing in the world, or any other—if there was another—that could ever possibly be faultless enough to compare to those beautiful, calm, insightful, affectionate, cerulean eyes of his. There was no contest whatsoever.

My intense thinking died down along with the music, the tune of both slowly beginning to simmer down into nothing but a memory of something distant as silence eventually covered everything in the dim lighting. Everything was quiet and serene, but it drove me mad inside, doing nothing but waiting and thinking of what I could possibly do or say next.

My heart was still beating in rapid-fire mode within my chest, sending the blood rushing to my cheeks, causing my face to suddenly become very red and hot. I'd never felt so flustered, and in the silence that was thick enough to divide with a toothbrush settling itself around us made my heartbeat seem that much louder.

Thoughts raced in time with my sounding heart, the swift pound of the mini-drum in my chest was starting to give me a headache as I attempted to think. But nothing even came to me, and I doubted that having remained calm would've helped me any. _What do I say…? What do I do…? I've never heard anything this beautiful before…Never… _

With a small, quiet sigh to at least try to calm myself so I didn't seem like a freak of nature with a crush on the first thing she looked at, and then end up mauling that one thing, even though the kind of maul she knew was to tackle, then hug, and then drown whoever it was with all the adoration that had been built up after all of the time that they'd spent apart, I slid across the bed over to sit next to Rex. After a few moments in the intense silence of the night, he broke the hushed streak by questioning me timidly, almost as if he were slightly afraid to know of the answer, "So…what did you think of it?"

I didn't even pause to let the serene-ness of the night set in again before all kinds of words were trying to fall out of my mouth. Though, my tongue was still tied up in knots, and only about one eight millionths of those words actually got out of me. "…I've never heard anything more…beautiful." I told him quietly, my face slowly turning red as I noticed the mistake I had made: I hadn't realized how close I'd actually moved towards Rex when I'd shifted places. A small movement of my hand up and over to the right a ways, and I would be close enough to twirl that soft, silky blonde hair around my fingers like I'd been wishing I had the liberty to do ever since I'd first realized what the feeling inside me really was.

Rex blushed lightly, the pink dusting over his cheeks ever so lightly, but enough to make his face glow like a poinsettia. He continued to look down at the floor like he had been since he asked for my opinion on the song, and nodded his head slightly, thanking me for the compliment without having opened his mouth at all.

I closed my eyes in an attempt to calm myself so I didn't accidentally squeal like a Twilight fan girl would if she saw Robert Pattinson or Taylor Lautner, and took a deep, calming breath before telling him in a very quiet tone, "Thank you for the music…" Suddenly, I realized I had no idea what to say next besides 'That song was beautiful. And so are you'. "Uhh…Good-night…?" I stood up from his bed and, accompanied with an awkward silence, walked speedily over to the door.

I was almost out of the door and into the safety of the hallway when Rex's sweet, harmonic voice called out gently to me, sending chills down my spine and hot blood up to my face, "You're welcome…Good-night…" I smiled to myself, noting to myself that I wasn't the only one who was at a loss for words (Hopefully), and turned to cast him a small, truly happy smile. Almost as if he understood that I hadn't felt this glad to be with another person instead of alone in a very, very long time, Rex sent the same genuine smile that I always seemed to be getting from him.

I walked out of his room in a meandering sort of fashion, a smile that told the whole world I'd made a fool of myself and I didn't care whatsoever. That was how I wanted to feel all the time, but it never turned out that way. Currently, though, all those thoughts of the past that always used to creep up on me at times like this couldn't get a good grip on me, and my cheeriness remained untainted and mine. All mine.

As I found myself in the living room, I couldn't stop myself from making an even bigger fool out of myself—and all in one day, mind you—by doing what you could call 'The Happiest Dance a Human Being Could Ever, Ever Do'. I could hear Zoe and Max conversing about what board game they should screw around with throughout my little dancing shebang. I was slightly surprised that they hadn't seen or heard me yet.

But I didn't care one little, tiny bit that they were in there. I could've been in the middle of a Justin Bieber concert and on the stage and I would still be doing the exact same thing I was doing in the middle of the Taylor's living room with only two people semi-paying attention.

When they finally did notice me, they both stared for a few moments, their mouths agape in the shock of seeing me so incredibly pumped that I didn't give a goose egg if they saw my bad/'creative' happy-dance moves. Like, half a minute after they got over a bit of their shock—Zoe didn't really get over it, yet—a huge grin split Max's face, and he ran to my side, and, to my surprise, began mirroring the basic moves I was doing. It was a sight you'd pay to see, but also an insult to me at the same time. He wasn't even trying to best me at this, and he was.

Zoe continued to stare at us as if we were the two most psychotic people she had ever met, or seen, in her life. But after a while she offered a slight shrug of her shoulders before skipping over to where we were, and starting to do the exact same thing. It would've felt more complete if Rex had been in on it too, however.

I stopped abruptly a few minutes after she joined us, only because Dr. Taylor had just walked into the room and had made a motion that made it seem clear that he was about to join our dysfunctional, odd little trio and make it a quartet. No offense to Dr. Taylor in any way, but I did _not_ want to see him attempt to dance. At all.

*line thingy here

Zoe left for her own house an hour or two later (Mainly because there was nothing on the television here, so she thought the channels might be different back at her place). For a little while there, I could've sworn she was going to spend the night just to figure out why I seemed so blissful all of a sudden. I was pretty glad that the television channels had convinced her otherwise.

Rex had stayed in his room after playing the music for me; out of curiosity I'd gone to check on him, and seen that his light was off and he was already fast asleep. I couldn't say the same for Max, though. He'd bet me all the money he had in his piggy bank—it was all change, by the way, and I hadn't even accepted the bet—that he could pull an all-nighter even if he didn't open his eyes for the rest of the night. Anyone would've thought that this was an easy bet to win from their side of it, but knowing Max and how incredibly determined and stubborn he could be at times, I thought it best just to ignore him. I should've taken it; he was snoring after another five and a half minutes.

I glanced over at the clock between both the snores of Max and his father (The guy was so loud that you could hear him from their room, which was a couple of good-sized rooms away. Midnight, exactly. _No wonder Max passed out so fast. He can never keep his little eye balls open for over twelve hours._ A string of drool ran out of the side of his mouth, long enough that from the angle of his head it was able to drip down all the way to the floor, beginning to make a small pool as his salivation continued. _There's no way I'm going to risk moving him. Not when there's a chance I'll be digested just by walking up to him. _

Completing the mission tonight crossed my mind ever so slowly, like a cold, crisp breeze in the middle of a harsh winter. I knew that everyone would be vulnerable this late at night after running around everywhere all day, and they wouldn't see it coming whatsoever. The only thing I would have to worry about was accidentally waking someone up, and then having them grow suspicious about why I was sneaking around the house so late at night. _But Zoe's not here tonight. I'd have to waste a lot of time and endurance trying to find her house, and then by the time I actually got there, if I did, I would be in a bad mood and might not be as careful about finding her DinoHolder._

I knew how long my patience would last me, and by the time I found her house, it would be long gone and I would be just about ready to explode so I could release all of that stored aggravation. It would be counterproductive if I even thought about going out to find her DinoHolder anymore than I already was. _So…later it is, then._

I couldn't exactly sleep on the couch like I was now accustom to since I'd arrived here, mainly because Max and his ocean of acid-spit were already inhabiting it, therefore marking it as 'Occupied'. I thought about stealing his bed for the night; it would be nicer than sleeping on the damp rug by the couch, or pulling an all-nighter like he had tried to just so I could figure out another way to betray three now-friends-not-so-much-enemies of mine.

Although, after one step—more like sniff—inside of Max's doorway (Not to mention stepping on something that I didn't even want to know what was), I made my decision faster than a bolt of lightning striking the tallest place on Earth. There were no doubts or second-guesses here: I was spending the night awake in my own head (A.k.a, pulling an all-nighter to think about doing something against my better judgment).

I walked back into the living room, and dropped into a sitting position on the floor with a thud. Leaning back to rest my head against the wall, I closed my eyes—not such a good thing, might I add, if you're trying to pull and all-nighter. I could hear the gentle (And some not so gentle) snores of everyone in the house, and realized for the first time in a long time that this was what I wanted in my life. I wanted to live in a place, with people, that I could get along with all the time. I wanted to feel comfortable in the atmosphere when I was with them, and when I was here, with Rex, and Max, and everyone, I did. It was where I was supposed to be.

If I hadn't been here on a mission to befriend and betray them.

I couldn't decide what was more important to me: My newfound friends, or Seth's pride in me. I knew that there was no contest here, but I couldn't help it. I'd been fighting for Seth's trust in me, for him to see that I was more than just matter taking up space that he could use for something far greater for so long…I couldn't remember anything in the world that I'd ever wanted more than him to be pleased with something, anything, that I did. _Well, maybe something else to strive for. But that doesn't really count all that much._

Suddenly a tingling sensation tickled my leg, and I figured with a mental shrug that it had just fallen asleep (My limbs were lucky; they didn't have to think about crud they didn't have anything to do with). But I figured that it wasn't my leg when I noticed that it kept happening over and over again. _…If this isn't weird, I'm Elvis Presley. 'Thank ya, thank ya very much'…Yeah, bad imitation; that is just not right._

Finally it bothered me enough that I decided to check my phone to see it that was what was causing the vibrating. Then it hit me: My phone was on vibrate. I struggled to rapidly yank my phone out of my pocket, and when I actually did, I didn't want to answer it. Seth was calling, and I could tell just by the way the phone seemed angry that whatever he had to say was urgent, and clearly had something to do with the mission.

But I couldn't stop myself from answering it with a shaking hand and voice, and raised to phone to my head against my better judgment. "…What is it, Seth? What do you want?" I noticed that not only by my tone, but by my words that I was acting as if I were talking to a murderer like the Chainsaw Massacre guy over the phone. I wanted to just hang up, burn the phone with the stove, and forget about all of this. But I couldn't.

"Have you completed the mission, or do I need to send Rod and Laura to do your job for you because you're too weak to do what you're told?" _Well, that was pretty blunt. Not to mention, rude. But I should be used to it by now, after a couple of years. _Seth's voice was cold and emotionless like a vampire with his mind only focused on harming others, or a zombie that only wanted to hear the screams of its victims.

Ignoring the fact that I was now afraid to look out the window to see what had just made that scratching noise I'd heard, I reluctantly answered Seth, my voice showing by gloominess for what I'd decided, "No, but I'm sitting in the house right now. I have two of them here for sure, but I'll take a look around for the third, otherwise someone can always come back for it. I'll be heading back out for Zeta Point in about ten minutes, fifteen at the most if anything happens. I'll call if I'm caught, but I doubt it will happen."

"Good. We'll be awaiting your arrival." He told me without any change to his tone at all before I heard the click of him hanging up. I flipped my phone closed without much thought as if in a trance, and banged my head against the wall with a growing headache and a loud puff of a sigh. I could hardly believe that after all that I'd done and all that I'd accomplished, he still gave me absolutely no reaction whatsoever. I knew that that should've been more than enough reason for me to go back on what I'd said once before and quit the mission before all of this went too far to turn back, but deep down inside I still felt that he would show some kind of emotion for me if I actually got the DinoHolders to Zeta Point.

I glanced around the room when I suddenly heard a strange, heavy breathing near me. I was greeted by Aza walking up to me, the only sounds being her loud breathing and claws clicking on the ground. I smiled down at her and gave her a small pat on the head, though I couldn't help but feel a little guilty for not spending that much time with her or the other little dinosaurs since I'd been here. I'd been so busy with the mission and keeping the others occupied that I'd pretty much forgotten all about them.

I saw a flash of blue near the table that at first I could've sworn was Rex sneaking around so I wouldn't see him. But upon a second glance I saw that it was only Ace, Rex's dinosaur, so in a way, it was him (Not to mention, I also saw that Zoe's DinoHolder was sitting on the corner of the table). I heard something shuffling coming down through the hall and hoped to the heavens that it wasn't any of the dysfunctional little group that I'd grown so used to being around lately. But when I looked up, I saw only Chomp and Paris (Seriously. How do you forget your own dinosaur at somebody's house?). Chomp yawned as if he'd been doing all kinds of excruciating work all day long, then ran up to me and bit down on the tip of my shoe like he'd seen something dangerous and was trying to save me from it.

I snickered, but stopped abruptly when Chomp ran back into the hall, and into Max's room, jumping up on the bed when he got there. He curled up on something lumpy underneath the blankets, but I wasn't exactly sure what. I slipped inside, and walked over to his bed, but saw that it was only Max, and he was fast asleep.

I walked back down the hall, now headed for Rex's room. I moved as quietly as I could into his room, knowing that the floor creaked in some places and trying to avoid said spots as best I could, though I did end up stepping on one or two of those places. The sound made him roll over in his sleep, and I stopped breathing; what would I say if he woke up? I cringed when Ace ran past me over all of the squeaky places in the floor and jumped up onto his bed without a single care in the world. I knew that Rex was going to wake up, and his little blue dinosaur was going to be my downfall. I was almost melancholy when even that entire rumpus hadn't woken him up.

I picked up his DinoHolder, feeling his essence surge through my DNA like lightning when I did. But the feeling was different now than it had been before; it used to make me so happy I couldn't stop smiling, but now…it struck me like a nail to the hand, almost as if it were telling me that what I planned to do was wrong, and begging me with those deep blue fawn eyes not to do what I thought I had to.

But I made my decision…and I couldn't say that I was very proud of it afterwards.

I tightened my grip on his DinoHolder, my palm starting to get a little sweaty from my nervousness and how all of these predicamids were racking my brain and killing me each and every little step of the way. I returned Ace to his card, and walked out of the room quickly, suddenly not caring if I made any noise. For some reason, I was hoping that someone would wake up and stop me. At least then I wouldn't have to choose whether or not to do this. The choice would already have been made.

I went back to Max's room, and snatched his up with a hint of regret falling from me into the carpeted floor beneath my feet like dead cells that continually drop off of all living things. I returned the sleeping triceratops to its card before going back to the living room for the final dinosaur and DinoHolder. After retrieving it, my conscience repeated to me over and over again that it wasn't too late to forget all of this, but I ignored it yet again, and left the house, heading for the jet that would help me to betray my only true friends.

* * *

I jumped into the jet the moment I got to it, and got into the air in an instant. I took the DinoHolders out of my pockets and put them down on the seat next to me. It was torture to feel their warmth so close to my skin, which was already burning with guilt that I'd never felt before. Who knew that a feeling that hurt this bad could be so intense?

I would glance at them occasionally, and all of them just stared at me the whole time. I couldn't do anything to escape their gazes. The fault of what I'd done to all of them was filling me up, from the soles of my shoes to the roots of every hair on my head. It kept filling me up, and up, and up, until I didn't think I could hold any more of the feeling, but surprised myself because it still didn't leave me alone.

I shook my head, not wanting to continue with the agony that this was causing me, but knowing full well that it wasn't going to stop anytime soon. I tried to focus all my attention on steering the jet, but I knew that I wouldn't be able to do that when the essences of my friends were haunting me like ghosts of people that I'd murdered though all that I'd done was take three devices from my friends, along with their dinosaur partners. I hadn't killed anyone, though the feeling could've fooled me in a heartbeat.

I tried desperately to calm myself down, knowing that if I had a serious mental breakdown in the middle of flying the jet I would end up getting myself killed, even though it would've been a lot better than having to feel all of this go on inside of me. Half of me was trying to beat the other half up for feeling so terrible about what I'd done and shouting that it had to be done, while the bloody half was tearing itself apart and screaming about how full of ice I had to be to be able to do something like this.

I stabbed my best friends in the back, and all for the hope of receiving Seth's praise.

My eyes closed involuntarily, my consciousness trapped between leaving my head and staying there to help steer the jet (Thankfully, though, when my hands dropped from the gears, the tips of my fingers brushed the auto pilot just rough enough to turn it on, otherwise I would've been a flying deadman). I guess you could say that I'd put myself into some kind of trance; even to this day I'm not very sure about what went on.

Nevertheless, all my memories of the past few days played over and over in my mind, most all of them seeming to revolve around Rex. All of the things I told him, true or not, all of the smiles, all of the laughs we shared, the music he played for me, the glow I always saw in his eyes when he looked at me. Everything replayed itself inside my head. And in that small moment, I realized what was really important to me in this life.

My eyes snapped open suddenly when my thoughts were rudely interrupted by my cell phone ringing. I realized when I yanked it out of my pocket, irritated for the disturbance, that I'd barely used it for anything other than for things concerning the mission and had never gone through with my plan of seeing all that it could do. But, ignoring that for the moment, I picked it up and answered, "…Yes?"

"You should be getting back any minute now." A strangely chipper Seth replied, barely noting—actually, _not_ noting—the slight irritation in my voice even though I'd only spoken one word. I never thought I'd hear a happy-like sound com out of him, or even anywhere near him. Too bad it that nice change wasn't going to end up being permanent. I'd made a new choice, and I could actually find a way to be incredibly proud of myself for it.

I took a deep breath and let it out as a quiet sigh; even though this was the right thing to do, and I knew that I was never going to be able to fulfill anything I'd ever wanted to do or have in my life if I didn't, it was still a little hard to leave everything that had made me the kind of person I was—the one who actually did know the difference between right and wrong, and was alright when they realized that they'd been on the side of wrong for their whole lives—and go on to something I'd never had in my life before. But after a few seconds, I got it out, and for once, my words and mind worked together exactly how I wanted them to. "…I'm turning around, Seth. I'm not coming back."

"What?" He practically shouted into the phone, his voice full of confusion and frustration for my statement. It was pretty clear to anyone that would've heard him that he'd never expected me to suddenly turn on him at the very peak of completing one of the most important missions there had ever been. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"I would say I'm sorry, but I've been taught not to lie. And I'm not going to make the mistake of doing that again. I refuse to live under you like a dog begging for scraps from the table when I can have something so much better. I will not fight for you anymore, Seth; I'd rather fight with those that consoled me in a time of need, and didn't send me out to do their dirty work." I retorted, a small smile crossing my face; I'd never gotten to say anything like that to Seth before, and it was like giving the bird to a master that had continually made your life as a slave a living hell. I flipped the phone closed without another word, having nothing else to say to him anyways, and threw it behind me. I would find a way to block all of his calls one way or another a little later on.

I swerved the jet around with a sudden jerk, my brain pounding so hard I found it nearly impossible to think at all. I was going back to the life I'd always wanted, to be with the people I'd dreamed of once upon a time. I knew what I wanted now; I knew how my story was supposed to play out, and how it was going to end.

I wasn't going to make the mistake of crawling back to Seth like a puppy that had chewed up a slipper and got itself thrown out into the snow. I had found a home, and traded it for honor. That didn't mean I could trade it back with ease, but I was going to try. And when I did…I planned to stop chasing cars heading nowhere and spill my heart out to an angel with a golden violin.

* * *

Well, there you have it. That, my readers, is how it all ends. If any of you were expecting that, I have no idea. But if you wanna let me know if you were or not, go ahead and write it down in your review. I don't think I have anything else to say, so, with that, it is 9:50 PM here, so I'm going to sleep. Have a nice...day/night (I guess it depends on where you are).


	8. Epilogue

**Okay, I know that I was just going to leave Chasing Cars the way that it was and let the readers think up whatever ending that they wanted, but I was reading through some of my reviews for that story, and then skimming the story itself and remembering how much fun it was to write about all of that crazy stuff that I finally convinced myself to give you guys a real ending to it. *applauds self***

**I am so so so so _so_ happy with how this came out. I wrote seven pages of it just last night, and then finished it up about ten minutes ago, ending on page ten. So, yeah, I had a lot of loose ends to tie up, and I think that I got them pretty well. **

**I don't _plan_ on making a sequel to this, but if Rex continues to be the object of my focus for much longer, it might happen. But no promises, since I have no clue what I'd even do if I were to consider writing a sequel. Nevertheless, I'll still think about it if you guys want me to.**

**Okay then! Enough of my babbling, and please enjoy the official end of Chasing Cars!**

* * *

Epilogue

All kinds of worries and possible outcomes were racing through my mind—all of them with a horrid ending, I might add—as I walked back up the sidewalk to the house I'd robbed only maybe three hours before. I'd been far too conscious about the fact that I'd stolen from three of the only friends I'd ever had to try and get the love and respect from my used-to-be legal guardian, Seth, that I'd never thought to be aware of how long I'd been gone.

My footsteps seemed unnaturally loud as I came up to the front door—still unlocked, just as I'd left it. My mouth was dry, like you'd expect a nomad's to be as he wandered aimlessly throughout a frozen desert, guided only by the map the stars laid out and the light of the perfect moon. However, I was not as at ease as said wanderer may or may not have been. At least he wasn't risking his paradise, his only chance at happiness.

He hadn't stolen his friends' Dino Holders—then again, his friends probably didn't have them, but still. Same basic point still applies.

I stood in front of the door—I was no longer sure if it was the door to heaven or the door to hell, there was no sign of fire nor of any blessed light to tell me which—and trembled like a statue in the middle of an earthquake. I'd seen this kind of thing on TV before since Zoe loved to watch movies about some evil person having a change of heart, then coming to make it up to whoever he or she had wronged. But I'd never imagined that it would really be this hard—they made it look so simple for crying out loud!

In the movies, all they had to do was barge through the door with tears streaming down their faces, state that they'd been wrong, blubber out apology after apology, and by the end of it all, they were already wrapped up in their lover's arms. Forgiven. Indisputably, improbably, inconceivably, _impossibly_ forgiven. It was stupid how easily it always was for the do-gooder to say 'it's okay, it's okay, I don't hate you' to the used-to-be bad guy.

But was that really how it happened in real life? No. It wasn't. And that terrified me to no end.

Still, I had to return the Dino Holders. No matter what happened besides that.

Turning the knob and pushing the door open as quietly as I could manage, I peeked into the living/entry room and saw that there were no lights on, though the sun was just starting to rise outside (Darn me and my inability to pick a halfway decent time to get the devices and get out, but still leave enough nighttime to be able to come back if I were to change my mind). No one was up yet. That fact gave me a bit more comfort.

Zoe was still sleeping soundly on the couch, just as she had been when I'd left. As soon as I was absolutely positive that she wouldn't wake upon my entering the home, I stepped inside and slowly closed the door behind me. Not even wanting to risk waking her thanks to the click of the lock, I continued into the room in favor of leaving the door unlocked. Nobody—aside from me—was going to break in.

I tiptoed into the semi-dark room, though the light seeping in through the windows was beginning to grow bright enough to throw a thin shadow on the ground as I crept along. The sight sent a shiver of panic down my spine. I had to hurry up, or they might wake up and find their Dino Holders missing before I had the opportunity to either put them back where I'd found them previously or think up some believable lie about why I had them—

_No. No more lies. If they wake up, you're going to tell them what really happened, and why you came here. _

The thought was said so strongly in my head, with such finality…It made me afraid to think about what might happen if they really did wake up, leaving me with no time to think of alibis, or methods of escape. But in my heart, I knew that my mind was right. If they got up before I had the chance to clear my pockets of all this incriminating evidence, then I would be honest. I'd show them the blood on my hands and admit to having murdered any life our friendships could've had.

I slinked over to the coffee table where I'd found Zoe's Dino Holder before, and set it down where I remembered it having been (I wasn't sure how good the magenta-haired girl's memory was, so I decided it was best to be as specific as possible when it came to the details). Then, reminding myself once again about the details (stupid details), I picked the device back up, and brought Paris back out of her card. It would be a little more than obvious that something weird had happened last night if she—or any of them, for that matter—were to wake up and find their dinosaurs missing.

The pale green Parasaurolophus came out of her card without a sound, but I nearly flipped my lid when she jumped up onto the couch to nestle in beside Zoe. To keep myself from freaking out too badly, I grasped my chin-length bangs and pulled down hard, biting my bottom lip as I did so. I waited impatiently for Zoe to wake up, ask me what I was doing, and then have me be completely unable to explain myself.

I dreaded that moment like death itself. Except, death didn't seem to bad right now, so maybe that wasn't the right comparison. Perhaps entering hell was a better example. Or running out into a blizzard after putting on clothes that you'd drenched the snot out of in the bathtub. Maybe stapling bacon to your skin and racing out into a pack of starving dogs.

Anything, absolutely anything, was worse than what I feared right now.

Zoe never did wake up despite Paris' slightly obnoxious attempt at it. Seeing now that I had nothing to be truly afraid of, I released my abused hair and took a few calming breaths, closing my eyes to try and aid in the process of soothing my fraying nerves. I'd learned after some time that whenever I got really freaked out, I would take it out on myself by yanking on my hair. When I was younger, I recalled having pulled on Seth's instead. It wasn't all that surprising that he'd gotten me to start hurting myself instead, though.

My eyes rose from the spot on the floor they'd wandered to and my gaze landed on Zoe's sleeping face. She seemed so…at ease now, this girl that had been bothering the stuffing out of me for the past couple of days. And yet, I felt like it was my own fault that my temper had gotten out of hand so many times. No, I didn't _feel_ it, I knew it was true. If I would've been more caring about who she was as a person, and less about what I needed to gain from her, then maybe we could've been better friends.

But it was too late now.

I cast her one last remorseful look before stalking quietly out of the room, moving my feet with such care that I surprised myself by how gentle I could be. I'd never been the kind of person who was smooth when it came to…well, anything, and I wasn't the type of girl who was able to handle everything with an air of confidence and grace. Heck, I was pretty much the exact opposite of both of those things and I knew it well. I wanted to be like those girls, but…you can't change who you are.

After shuffling through the hallway to Max's room, I proceeded to open the door with a lot less concern regarding waking him than what I had with the front door. I knew that Max wouldn't wake up no matter what I did, though. I could get a whole pep band in here from the high school a couple miles away and have them play as loud and as horribly as they possibly could, and the most he would probably do is start snoring louder to drown them out.

I pulled the second to last Dino Holder out of my pocket, and weighed it in my hand for a moment, thinking. Max had always been a good friend to me, even when I was trying to kill him or beat the crazy out of him. He'd made me laugh, face palm, and he'd made me question everything I'd once thought about cooking and bacon. We'd fought a bit here and there, but really, didn't every friendship have its rough spots?

In some ways, friendship was like the sea. Or, if you want to think of it in a way that was easier to remember, it was like an actual ship sailing on the ocean. Sometimes you had nice weather, calm waters, and a happy crew to work with, but during the same day you might face typhoons, wicked waves that soared above your vessel and sprayed all on board with salty rain, and had…a not-so-happy group of sailors, I guess. Either way, you were still stuck together in the middle of a watery desert, and you had to work through the hard times no matter what.

Unless you were betrayed by one of your crew members. Then you had every right to throw him to the sharks and watch as they came and tore him apart, watch as his blood turned the water into a frothy new liquid, listen as he screamed and screamed and screamed for God to have mercy on his soul, for his friends to forgive him before he finally died of blood loss. Before the sharks devoured his lungs, his brain, his liver. His heart.

I shuddered momentarily at the vivid pictures that ravished my mind like beautiful music, though this wasn't pretty in the least bit. Sometimes, I suppose, Seth could be right: I had a very active imagination. Sometimes it was helpful (to him, anyways), like when I would imagine all kinds of ways that he might punish me if I were to ever cross him or make him really angry. And sometimes it was kinder to me, like the times when I used to try and convince myself that there was something out there waiting for me, something somewhere that was better than Zetta Point. Better than Seth.

I'd found it. But I'd burned every bridge that might lead me back to it.

Gulping back the knot of emotion that had tied my throat closed, I brought Chomp back out of his card, the bright orange-ish yellow triceratops appearing at my feet within mere seconds. He looked up at me with his soft coal eyes, clearly asking me why I'd done what I had. _I've been asking myself the same question since the day that I agreed to come here. _My thoughts were true enough, but all in all, I knew in my heart that I knew exactly why I'd done this.

I'd gone through with Seth's plan because Seth and Zetta Point were all that I'd ever known. I didn't have an option back then, when Seth had become my guardian. With my parents gone, I had needed someone to take care of me while I grew, to protect me from the dark of the night, and to teach me the difference between right and wrong. But Seth hadn't done any of that, aside from keep my alive.

He had raised me as he would have raised a beast he hoped to use to destroy the world one day: Without a care in the world regarding my emotional state, nor asking if I wanted to be a part of any of that which he'd already mapped out for my life. There was no list of options for me to choose from. There was nowhere else that I could go to get away from him and his tyranny. Aside from him, I was alone in the world.

All that I could do was try to make the best of what I had, try to get Seth to see that I was worth all of his effort. I remained vigilant in my studies for the longest while, only pausing to rest when I simply couldn't stand to look at anything that one might refer to as a book or a piece of paper. I would read and work and study until I couldn't feel my fingers or tell which marks on the page were the spaces between the words and which were the words themselves. I did all of that for that selfish, hateful, controlling shell of a human being.

I did all of it so that he might see that I was worth something, that he didn't have to look down on me because I _was_ good enough. I _could_ stand beside him and belong there. I could be whoever he wanted me to be, and do anything that he asked of me. Looking back at my life now and how I would've done anything for his acceptance, maybe even a glance that one might catch a note of affection in, I was afraid to realize that I wouldn't have thought twice about anything that he asked me. _Anything_.

Shivering again at the horrid thoughts that that notion brought to my overactive imagination, I shook my head at Chomp, uncertainty clouding my eyes. I couldn't be sure what had blinded me to the fact that this place, here with the D-Team, was the place where I'd truly belonged. I didn't know why I'd tried so hard to be loved by Seth. I had no clue why I'd followed his orders right down to the end of it all, right to the moment when I broke down and couldn't take his torments any more.

When I chose to do the right thing for what seemed like the first time in my life.

_But that doesn't even matter now, does it? Why does anything matter anymore? I'm going to have to leave everything and everyone that I've grown to love because I can't stay here, and I can't go back to Ursula and Rod and Laura because they're back at Zetta Point with Seth and probably hate me as much as he does right now. I have no place here, there, or anywhere—_

My whole body froze in place when Max started to stir in his bed, rolling around and groaning as he started to wake up. I'd made no noise when I set his Dino Holder down, and Chomp hadn't moved or made any kind of sound either, but yet here he was, opening his sleep-fogged eyes to see me there in his room. He'd caught me red-handed. And Chomp wasn't helping by jumping up onto the bed and bouncing around a lot.

"Rante?" His voice was groggy even as he tried to evict the tire from it, rubbing his left eye sleepily as well. "What are you doing in here so early? If the Boogeyman's bothering you, then you don't have to worry 'cause he's actually pretty nice. Just tell him that you're still sleepy and he'll be all cool and be like, 'Oh, that's all right. I'll give you five more minutes, then I'll kill you'. He's usually pretty good about waiting until after you're done dreaming too—"

I knew that the idea that he'd just given me wasn't a very believable notion, but I made a split-second decision that I didn't care one itty-bitty little bit if it was logical or not. It just had to work. "You're actually dreaming right now, Max. If you weren't, how would I be able to do this?" I raised both my hands and did the stupid little trick where you bend one of your fingers in and pretend that you're really pulling the very tip of it off. The brunette appeared to buy it, judging by the look of his face. "But you have to finish up dreaming so that my good buddy the Boogeyman can do his job and leave. He's got a meeting to make this morning and he can't be late."

Max's now wide eyes stared at me blankly for a moment or two, perhaps trying to decide whether or not his mind thought that I was telling him the truth. I prayed to anyone who might be listening right now that he would believe me; I wasn't ready to spill my guts out to him, or anyone for that matter. If I did, there was a very, very, very high chance that my pent-up emotion might be too much for me to contain and I'd start sobbing like my best friend had just been killed.

But such a breakdown didn't appear to be necessary yet. After another few seconds passed, a very serious, let's-get-down-to-business-then expression popped onto Max's face and his head hit the pillow mere milliseconds later. Chomp did pretty much the exact same thing, leaving me staring at the sleeping pair, still doing the finger-trick, wondering how in the world I'd just pulled that off so flawlessly (well, 'flawlessly' would've been not waking him up, but still. It went pretty well for a fail).

I backed out of the room as slowly as I could, hoping that he wouldn't suddenly wake up like he just had and scare me half to death again. Even though death was the only thing that I really felt like I deserved right about now, but even then I shouldn't be able to escape from this emotional torture so easily. I needed to feel this way, to be punished in one of the only ways that no one on earth is powerful enough to stop.

One hand gripped my shirt over where my heart would be as I closed the door, feeling as if I was about to crumple to the ground in agony if I didn't hurry up and get out of here. My face contorted in a grimace as I struggled to hold back a whimper, a cry, a sob, anything that my body might think would be a fun way of waking up the rest of the house.

I stood there, hunched over myself with one hand trying to hold my sporadic heart down and keep it inside my chest, for a couple of minutes, time that I didn't have. I only had one Dino Holder left to put back, one dinosaur left to re-animate, then I could run as far away from this pain as my legs were able to carry me. I could run to the farthest corner of the world, curl up under a rock in a deep cave somewhere, and wait for it to rain so that I could drown, sleep with the fishes, die in another world I didn't belong in.

I stared down the hallway at Rex's door, ajar for whatever reason. _Oh, yeah. That was my fault. Right. _Sighing internally at my stupidly forgetful nature, I started forward toward the last room, the last friend that I'd betrayed, and perhaps the one that bothered me the most. I knew why it had been so hard to consider the idea that I might never get to spend another moment with Rex after completing the mission so long ago, back when I still had the chance to stop myself. It was obvious, and I could deny it no longer.

I really did like Rex. A lot.

The blue-eyed wonder had been so sweet to me, so kind and compassionate. He'd been friendly and warm since the very first day that we'd met, when we'd been 'bonding' while putting one of his books back together after the little dinosaurs had gotten to it. I could still remember the way that he had looked at me when I'd been wearing that stupid little skirt that pink-haired menace had forced me into the day that she'd had dragged the three of us shopping with her—it was like he'd been looking at some kind of holy, angelic being, though I'd never been anything like that.

If anything, I was some kind of terrible, horrible, no-good demon who'd been created by the devil himself and had been sent to prey upon the minds of the believers here on earth. I was spawn of Satan, Dracula, a wicked beast of Tartarus that needed to be burned alive forever in the fiery furnace of hell. I needed to feel something as awful as I was for as long as I could stand it, and a thousand years after that point.

Gulping for the ump-teenth time this hour, I proceeded to push Rex's door open enough for me to be able to squeeze into the room like a slug. A slimy, wretched slug that wanted nothing more than to be taken out of its misery by a merciful shoe. There was a pale orange, yellow, and red-tinted light beginning to creep through the window in the same manner that I'd been slinking through the house so far. I had to get out of here, and fast.

But it was hard to rush knowing that this might be the last time that I got to see Rex's perfect face, even if it wouldn't be while he was awake. I slipped soundlessly over to his nightstand, remembering that that was exactly where I'd found it only hours before, and brought Ace back out of his card, immediately motioning for him to remain perfectly still, and perfectly quiet. He cocked his head at me, but seemed to notice my serious demeanor and obeyed despite how it went against his nature.

I stood there and stared at the Carnotaurus gazing back up at me, still confused but hushed, and thought for a moment about something that hadn't crossed my mind before: What was I going to do about Aza? I couldn't really bring her with me—she would make me happy, and after all the trouble that I'd caused and the hurt that I'd enforced on these people, I shouldn't be able to find any source of joy in my life ever again.

Convincing myself enough to know that it was the right thing to do, I brought Aza out of her card as well. She didn't seem to even have noticed the time that she'd spent apart from Ace, and I felt a sense of euphoria knowing that at least she would be able to lead a full and happy life. She, a friend of mine that I'd only had a few days' time to get to know, would have more than enough time to atone for the sin of having known me.

Having forgotten that she was just as prone to loud noises that easily woke up even the very heaviest of sleepers as Ace was, I completely ignored that fact that I should've made the 'hush-hush' gesture at her as well. Due to that lack of precaution, she convinced Ace with a simple glance that it was silly to listen to me and it was much more fun to jump onto someone's bed with as much force as one could muster. Ace saw her logic.

I instinctively backed up toward the door, ready to bolt if Rex showed any signs of waking as they hopped skillfully up onto his bed. He stirred slightly, rolling over to face me now, but let out a small, contented sigh before nuzzling back into his pillow. The two dinosaurs seemed mighty pleased with the heart attack that they'd just given me, so they proceeded to end their little scheme by curling up together by Rex's feet, fading into the world of sleep within a matter of seconds.

I watched the two of them breathing deeply, peacefully, for a moment or two, catching myself as I wished that I could be like them one day and be at peace with myself for what I'd tried to do. But I knew that that was something that I would never be able to do; my strict, pain-centered mind would not allow anything of that sort to enter my life. It had slipped up when Rex, Max, and Zoe had been able to pass through its security system. But it would not make the same mistake again, and I knew it well.

My eyes meandered up from the two little dinosaurs to Rex's sleeping face, his bright yet dark eyes closed serenely as he lost himself in dreams. The morning sunrise's light reflected off of his golden hair, making it seem to shimmer. It set his kind face aglow with the way that it framed his flawless eyes and smooth, pale cheeks.

I recalled every smile that he'd offered me, every laugh I'd heard from him, every gentle, loving word that he'd made my world spin 'round with. Growing up on that island with Seth and the others, I'd never had the opportunity to meet someone that I might actually like in a way much stronger than what friends felt for each other—I mean, I had Rod, and that was pretty much it. Not a lot to choose from.

But, of course, the first time that I really get to leave, I find the most perfect person in the world and end up not having enough self-control to keep myself from falling so deeply that not even a microscope would be able to find me in that dark hole I'd dropped down into. I mean, really, who _wouldn't _have expected that to happen? Honestly, sometimes I hated how foolish and unthinking I could be.

As if to prove just how unthinking I could be, my right hand reached out on a whim of its own and gently brushed a stray hair behind Rex's ear. The tickly sensation made him smile in his sleep, and the sight of that precious smile broke my already tattered heart. It ignited all the feelings that I'd been harboring for so long, all the things that I'd wanted to tell Rex once coming up to bubble in my throat, create turmoil in my eyes as they filled with tears, knowing that I would never be able to see that lovely face again.

I stole my hand away from his sleeping form, feeling my already unstable resolve beginning to crack in a million places. Tearing myself away from the holy kryptonite of my existence, I turned tail and fled the room, allowing the door to thump softly behind me as I ran. I dashed through the hallway alone, empty-handed, as I passed Max's room, rushed past Zoe's dozing place on the couch, and out the front door into the chilly morning air.

Darkness could still be noted in the sky, but it was beginning to be overrun by brilliant oranges and reds and purples and yellows and all kinds of other colors as the rainbow spectrum led the way for the sun like the red carpet before the celebrity. It was beautiful, inspiring really, but I took not a moment of time to stop and stand, staring awestruck at the glorious sky. I didn't have that kind of time. I had to spend the rest of my life in unimaginable pain, not standing staring at the second most beautiful thing in the world—

"Rante!"

The tears that I'd held back before came tumbling from my eyes at the sound of that voice, the voice that belonged to the loveliest, most valuable thing in my world: Rex Owen. They were not cheerful tears that fell, not relieved that someone had woken and I would get the chance to beg for forgiveness before I wasted the rest of my worthless life wallowing in depression and agony.

But they were from every time that Seth had told me I wasn't good enough, every single moment in my life that I hadn't been able to live up to his sky-high standards, every time that he hurt me without even trying to, every time that I wanted to cry but wasn't allowed to because 'dependable, respectable people never showed their emotions, never showed weakness'. I just couldn't help myself this time, though. I'd done something terrible, something that was going to ruin my life, and the only thing that kept me alive was going to be the first to be told the truth.

I heard the pattering of bare feet as Rex came over to me, still in his pajamas, apparently having been woken either when I'd stupidly touched his face or when I'd closed the door a tad bit louder than what a more clever person might've. Whatever the cause for his awakening, he was here now. With me. About to watch me fall apart after all these years of being able to handle the pain of Seth's emotional abandonment, but now having no idea how I'd even managed to contain myself for so many years.

The early morning sounded so happy to me, with its brightly hued, chirping little birds, and the crickets singing as they played hide-and-seek with said birds. The clouds turned to gold above me, illuminated by the heavenly glow of the sun as it set the sky ablaze. But the only thing that I could see was the pavement at my feet, blurred by my tears as they slowly blinded me. I could only hear the ragged beating of my heart and the slight hitching of my breath as I tried desperately to get a hold of myself.

"Rante," Rex's angelic voice sliced through my resolve like a knife through water, a hawk diving through the air like living lightning. I relished it and loathed it at the same time, knowing that I loved the sound but also telling myself over and over again that the more I heard it now, the more it would hurt later. Rex must've noticed my broken composure despite me not facing him; his tone became even tenderer as he came up to me. "Hey, what's wrong, Rante?"

I felt an iron-clad fist close around my throat at the innocent, trivial question. It was such a simple question to everyone else, but to me…it was so hard to think up an answer. It was so difficult because…well, _everything_ was wrong. I'd wasted my life trying to be good enough in the eyes of someone who would never care about me for even one moment in his life, and I'd thought that it was a good idea to steal from the only people who'd accepted me (albeit, they didn't know who I really was) in order to try and gain said sentiment.

Such thoughts only added to the torment that tore me up on the inside, and I dropped onto my knees, my face angled toward the ground so that Rex couldn't see that I was crying. Though, of course, he already knew. He knelt down on the ground beside me, and I could vaguely tell that he was saying something to me in a soothing tone, one arm wrapped around me, rubbing the shoulder farthest from him. But all I could focus on was what I was about to say.

My voice trembled so violently that I thought for a minute that maybe someone with extraterrestrial powers was physically shaking it, "R-Rex, I-I'm…I'm so…so sorry…! I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry! I-I'm a b-bad, bad, bad person, Rex, and you shouldn't have to know someone like me. I'm a terrible person and I shouldn't have come here…I shouldn't have met you—" A weak sob interrupted my verbal fit of self-loathing, and I raised a shaking hand to try and hide my tear-stained face, pressing my palm lightly to my eye as the salty tears began to sting.

Rex turned me around to face him, holding me by my shaking shoulders as I whimpered, my bottom lips quivering though I tried to make it stop by biting it. I could feel Rex's sapphire eyes searching my downcast face for a reason behind this sudden meltdown, but finding nothing he could understand, he gently voiced his confusion, "What are you talking about, Rante? You're a great person, and you haven't done anything wrong that you need to be sorry about—"

"Yes, I have, Rex…" I gulped one last time, feeling the weight of the world crashing down on me as I took in a quick breath and bled my heart out, knowing that there was no going back after this. My words came out as feeble whispers, the only thing that I could manage in this state. "I-I'm with the Alpha Gang. Seth adopted me when I was really little, and he trained me to be the evil creep of an agent that he'd always wanted…but I was never good enough for him.

"I did everything that I could to get him to at least notice that I was there, to make him see how hard I was trying to get him to at least pretend that my presence didn't completely disgust him. But he was never satisfied with anything that I did because there was always something I missed; he could find every single little flaw in whatever I'd done, and he'd exploit it until it was burned into my memory so I would never forget it again. He always told me I was a useless waste of space and that he shouldn't have taken me in when he had.

"But then h-he finally thought he'd found a use for me, just a couple of days ago. He told me that there was this enemy team, the D-Team, in Japan, and that I was the perfect person to go after the devices that they had because I could slip in amongst them, befriend them without them knowing who I was because I'd never met any of them before, and they'd never seen me with the others. He sent me away from Zetta Point, and he seemed so confident that I could succeed…he actually looked like he believed in me…

"I convinced myself that it didn't matter w-who the D-Team was, and that the only thing that was important was that I got back with the Dino Holders. But when I met them—when I met _you_...I started second-guessing myself at every turn. I couldn't decide whether or not it was wrong to do what Seth wanted, and I wasn't sure if _his_ love was really what I wanted. The more time I spent with you, and Zoe, and Max, the stronger and more demanding of an answer those thoughts became, until finally I made a split-second decision to d-do what h-he wanted…

"I stole the Dino Holders from the three of you—only a couple of hours ago, actually. But…b-but I just couldn't go back to that place. I couldn't go back to that coldhearted man waiting so impatiently for me to land the jet, just so he could ignore me again as soon as the Dino Holders were in his possession. So I came back, and I put them back, and I was going to leave and pretend that I'd never intruded in your lives.

"Rex, I'm so, so sorry for betraying your friendship, and for ruining everything b-because of all the stupid choices that I m-made. I know you can't f-forgive me for what I did, and I'm not going to ask you to, but I just wanted you to know why I would've been gone if you would've woken up a bit later, and who I really am…" I trailed off into silence when I could think of nothing else to say, aside from repeating apology after apology after apology. I'd said what I needed to, and now I had to leave here.

But I couldn't will my legs to stand; I couldn't even feel them underneath me anymore, though I knew they were still there. Feeling suddenly curious to know how Rex, currently silent, his hands still on my shoulders, still holding me close, had reacted to my lengthy confession, I lifted my tear-tainted eyes to glance up at his face.

I was shocked to see that he was gazing down at me tender, sad eyes, like he'd completely missed the part where I'd told him about how I'd tried to rob him and his best friends. With a voice like silk and hands that were soft and warm, he pulled me into an embrace, holding my bewildered body against his while he spoke gently into my ear, "I know who you are, Rante, and I'm sorry that you had to go through all of that because of him.

"But you're wrong. I _can_ forgive you, and I do. Your heart knew what it wanted to do all along; your mind just needed a bit more convincing after all that evil man put you through. And now that you're away from him, you never have to go back, and he's never going to be able to come and take you away. You're safe here with me. You don't have to be afraid of him anymore, and you don't have to struggle to be perfect, because you're already perfect to me. And I'm so happy to have met you, Rante.

"I forgive you, and I promise that you'll never have to feel this badly ever again," I wasn't sure if I was dreaming or not at this point. I'd never, ever expected that those words would ever be said to me by anyone in this world, and to be told this by Rex…it seemed so unreal. So…incredible, yet impossible at the same time. I was just waiting for someone to come and shake me awake, shouting, 'Just kidding!'

But that moment never came. I remained there, knelt on the sidewalk with my face buried in Rex's neck, breathing in his sweet, soothing scent as I cried. His arms held me tight, a feeling that I had only felt the pleasure of maybe a few times throughout my whole life, the sense that someone was going to protect you, to love you without question.

We stayed like that for…I wasn't even sure how long he comforted my broken soul. I'd lost all sense of time and our surroundings when he'd given me a sweet kiss on the top of my head, nuzzling his face in my hair afterward. To be perfectly honest, despite how terrible I still felt, I didn't really want this moment to end. I'd always wanted to hug Rex, though the idea had seemed foolish and unreasonable.

And yet, here we were.

After another few moments passed us by, the sun rising up ever so slightly to peek at us with cheeky curiosity, I noticed that the horrid feelings inside me were beginning to fade back into the recesses of my heart and mind, and my eyes were starting to run out of tears to shed as well. Nevertheless, Rex held me there, contentedly trapped within his warm embrace. I sighed gently into his neck and closed my eyes; all of my guilt and hurt had really taken a toll on me, not to mention the sleepless night.

I wondered for a moment about something that Rex had said, how he'd mentioned that Seth wouldn't be able to get at me while I was here. That little statement brought up a whole bundle of questions in my overactive mind. Would Seth be so angry with my leaving him that he would actually consider coming to get me? Did he think that having me on his side was really important enough to go through hall kinds of trouble to keep me from becoming a permanent part of the D-Team?

My thoughts were interrupted momentarily when Rex pulled away from me, his small, kind smile shining down upon me like some sort of guardian angel. I smiled back, the expression feeling so natural and genuine for what felt like the first time in my life. I'd never felt more complete, more happy and alive, than what I did right now. I wasn't sure if there was anything in the world that could prove to be better than this moment right here.

But I was proved wrong when Rex brushed away a tear that still clung to my cheek, his warm hand cupping my face affectionately. We stayed like that for a moment before Rex dropped his hand from my cheek and stood, offering his hand to help me up as he said, an air of perfection drifting through his words as he spoke so serenely, "Come on, Rante, let's go home."


End file.
